#erica's-music-exploration

[ericas-music-exploration]

Me? "SOUR"? As if...

Starting as a "SOUR" teenage girl crying over her ex Olivia Rodrigo is now spilling her "Guts" with her new album. Back in 2021 the Disney Channel actor Oliva Rodrigo released her first hit song outside of Disney “Drivers License” recently after her break up with co-star Joshua Bennet (fans believe). The song was a complete success and reached teens all over the world with over 1.1 billion streams. Just 5 months after the release of “Drivers License” Olivia dropped her first album “Sour”. Olivia’s songs are a bit too relatable for anyone who has dealt with heartbreak and she is very vocal about her pain, feelings of betrayal, and all the feelings one should feel while healing from a breakup.

 In the “SOUR” album one would get more of a pop vibe to it whereas in “Guts” it leans more into rock and this was a bit of a different vibe from Oliva. In her first album “SOUR” she had one song “Brutal” that had more of a rock vibe to it but a whole rock album is different for Olivia and fans seem to be loving it. To see the pop star express herself in rock is amazing. She is still singing about a past lover but bringing a new dynamic to her previous heartbreak music. You can even tell that there's a big difference in the album covers.

Over the past two years, we assume Rodrigo did a lot of healing and soul-searching to find a new version of herself and we can not only hear it in her change of genres but she is very vocal about it in her twelve new songs. In the “Ballad of a Homeschooled Girl,” she expresses that she “hate all my clothes and feels like my skin doesn’t feel right over my bones” The New York Times stated, “Olivia Rodrigo has seen the world and now she’s livid.” The songs in “Guts' ' compared to “SOUR” really show her growth and proves The New York Times right. She seemed to have a point of realization in this album whereas she was seemingly to be a bit delusional in her previous album. In her song “Vampire” she makes a few statements that show the growth she went through. Admitting that she “has made some real dumb mistakes” and how she admits that “she used to believe she was smart but you made me look so naïve' '. “Rodrigo is at her best, perhaps owing to her acting background, when delivering screeds in a kind of hyper-self-aware, spoken-word register. “Yes, I know that he’s my ex, / But can’t two people reconnect?” she poses with an almost audible wink on “Bad Idea Right?” a song on which she contemplates the self-destruction of rekindling an old romance. “I only see him as a friend / The biggest lie I ever said,” she adds, always shrewdly one step ahead of herself.”

“Overall, I see “GUTS” as the bi-curious and grungy older sister to “SOUR” and recommend it to any teenager with growing pains.” Olivia’s music is very popular and the numbers show its success and I’m positive that we will be getting more from Olivia in time. I wonder what other surprises she has in store for us…

[fanfictilltheend]

❤️‍🔥Violent Heart Part 1: ♪All I've ever learned from love was how to shoot at someone who outdrew you ♫ (or the VERY DARK Stepdad!Mechanic!Covict!Joel x Afab!you one)❤️‍🔥

A/n: It's here!!!!!! 18+ Only. This took me 7 freaking months so you mofos better like, reblog, and comment. This is both my most and least personal fic I've ever written and it is dark and relies heavily on plot (no smut until part 2 but i swear it's worth the backstory!!!!) READ ALL OF THE TAGS DO NOT COME FOR ME UNLESS YOU DID THIS FR FR. This ones for my dark joel fangirlies(guys and NBies) and the daddy issues fam ily ❤️‍🔥 (also not me naming my fic in part after hallelujah by leonard cohen but there is a reason!!!!!!!!!!)

Summary: The story starts with Part 1 where afab!Y/N is a child and Joel is her new stepdad and this story explores their relationship. Themes of abusive family, domestic violence, child abuse, daddy issues, physical violence, murder, stepcest (kinda b/c he is divorced from her mom technically but she grew up with him as her stepdad), infidelity, age gap, and more are explored throughout the fic. PLEASE READ SPECIFIC TAGS (part 2 tags will be added with the release of part 2). Part 2 picks up with Y/N at age 20 and how her relationship with Joel has changed and gets steamier. NOTHING SEXUAL OCCURS BETWEEN Y/N and JOEL until Y/N is 20!!!!!!! Also check out this playlist of music that's in the fic!!!!

Tags (PLEASE READ): Afab!you, stepdad!joel, mechanic!joel, convict!joel, no apocalypse au, Mentions of sex (little detail), mentions of male masturbation, infidelity, domestic abuse/violence, sibling abuse/violence (no one ever talks about sibling abuse but it’s very real), physical child abuse, neglect, allusions to past domestic violence, cursing, brief mention of pedophilia and kidnapping (David), allusions to committing future pedophilia (David), threats, cancer mention, Sarah death discussion, Tommy death mention, murder, prison, mentions of god and religion, fights, general violence, alcohol consumption, using music lyrics to move the plot, daddy issues, use of y/n

Word Count: ~15k

PART 2 (coming soon)

Ao3 Link

Violent Heart Masterlist

Full Masterlist of all my work

Joel Miller is not a good man, that he knows like the backs of his calloused hands. 

He knows loss too, feels it burrowed in the hollow cavity of his chest. Sees it in the face of every little girl he meets. 

The memories sting. 

He knows pain, deep in the depths of his character, down to the fundamentals of what makes him something that resembles a human being. The belts, the bigger hands, the harsh words, and then the grief. The recent Bring back my babygirl! The ancient ¡Basta, Papí, por favor, no Tommy, no Mamá! ¡Por favor no esta noche! The indignity of begging, always reduced to begging to a cruel man, an indifferent doctor, a cruel universe. 

He knows hard work, how to work with his hands. He knows the grit and grease of labor. Sees the cogs turning in the engines he fixes, relates to them. Feels like he knows them intimately because he is one too, chugging along day after endless day. But no one dares fix Joel Miller.

Until…

Her name is Erica and she’d like her front bumper replaced, please. She has long eyelashes and a soothing voice. And she has money too, at least more than he, who is almost broke from the cost of Sarah’s medical bills. She comes with baggage, Joel can tell from looking into her eyes, but then again so does he. And he hasn’t been laid in god knows how long. 

She takes him on a date and he lets her. She reveals she has two kids, but Joel doesn’t care. They fuck at her place while the kids are at school and she wants it soft, like her hands, and that’s how Joel gives it to her. 

A week later, Joel has moved in, which is good because his rent was due and he couldn’t pay it. He still hasn’t met the children.

***

It’s Joel’s day off and he’s sitting on the couch in his new home. His back hurts, but that’s nothing new. He’s got an excellent view of their nice, big backyard with a wooden fence. The kind of home he would have liked to have given Sarah. He sighs. Technically, nothing is wrong.

Then he sees it. It takes him a second to realize what is going on. It’s a whirlwind. He sees the back gate open and two tumbling forms fall over the threshold onto the manicured grass. One form is bigger, a boy of about twelve or thirteen beating the shit out of a much smaller form, fists flying. The other form is a little girl, no more than eight, defending herself like her life depends on it. Perhaps it does with the way he’s going at her. 

This must be the son, Aiden, and the daughter, Y/N. 

He’s a good boy, really, but he has anger issues sometimes. He’s been through a lot. That’s what Erica said, but Joel does not see a good boy. He sees a bully. A disproportionately violent one at that. Nothing that tiny girl could have possibly done could warrant the brutality he sees before him. 

Anger is something else Joel knows intimately, and that is what he greets when he runs outside to end the fray.

“Stop that!” he roars, pulling Aiden off of Y/N.

“Who the fuck are you!?” the boy screams, fury and hatred radiating off of his entire being. 

He continues thrashing and punching at nothing as Joel restrains him.

“I’m gonna kill her!” he screams, his eyes bulging.

“What the hell happened?” Joel growls, still holding onto the livid boy–verging on young man. 

“She ripped up my paper!” he bellows. “For no fucking reason! I worked hard on it!”

“It was a lie,” she says with so much conviction Joel almost flinches.

He looks down at the little girl, her nose bleeding, her right eye turning purple. She has tears streaked down her face, but she is not crying. Her shirt is ripped. The first thing he thinks of when he sees her is Sarah. Of course it’s Sarah, how could he not think of her? But this little girl is different, has a different look in her eye. This look is much harder and feels like she’s lived a thousand lifetimes. He thanks god Sarah never looked that way, but somehow he wants to hear about everything this little girl has experienced. Something twangs in Joel’s chest that he has not felt in what feels like an eternity. 

“It was not a lie, you stupid bitch whore!” Aiden shouts angrily, still fighting back against Joel’s unrelenting grip. “Take that back!”  

“No, you take it back! Dad is not a hero. You could’ve picked anyone to write about and you choose him? After everything he’s done?” she screams herself.

The sound of her voice is powerful but desperate. Joel feels himself needing to know more and bury himself deep inside her experiences.

“SHUT UP!” Aiden yells, finally ceasing his movements. 

A tear falls from his cheek. 

“If I let you go, will you stop whooping your sister?” Joel snaps firmly.

“Get away from me, you stupid cuck!” Aiden curses, turning his energy to Joel. “Who the hell are you to me? Fuck you! I’m out of here!”

He wriggles out of Joel’s grasp and Joel lets him go and Aiden storms back out the rear gate, slamming it behind him.

“You alright?” he asks Y/N.

Joel crawls over on his knees, still upright, closer to her. 

“Had worse,” she shrugs, running a hand through her messed-up hair. 

She wipes the tears and blood from her cheeks.

Joel shudders to imagine what she means.

“He always like that?”

“Yeah,” she nods. “So you Mom’s new boyfriend?”

“Something like that,” he nods back. ”’M Joel. Joel Miller.”

“I’m Y/N,” she says a bit mournfully. “Here,” she continues suddenly, reaching out a small hand to his cheek. She wipes blood (hers) gently off his stubbly face. “Didn’t mean to get ya dirty.”

Joel is nothing short of touched. He wasn’t even aware he could still have such a feeling. His cheeks go rosy pink. His heart pulses. He stares at her delicate hands and notices a long, thin scar on her left middle finger. 

“‘S no trouble, sweetheart,” he hears himself reassuring her. “Let’s get you cleaned up. Could even mend your shirt if ya want. Know how to sew and all.”

He reaches out a large hand, but she flinches at the sudden movement. A dull ache wells up in Joel’s chest. 

“Not gonna hurt you, honey. Swear it.” 

He wants with every fiber of his being for her to believe him, for it to be true. 

She takes his hand.

***

That evening Erica is still not home, working late Joel supposes. It is nine o’clock when Aiden slinks back into the house.

Joel stops him from making his way up the stairs. He is more than familiar with the art of creeping.

“Think you oughta apologize to your sister,” he says as gently as possible. Maybe he can impart some manners onto this unruly child now that he’s calmed down some. “You beat her real bad. You’re much bigger than her.”

“I’d do it again,” Aiden hisses, his eyes cold. “It makes me feel better.”

And then, to Joel, the answer is simple. What do you do with a bully who won’t repent? Fight him back. Show him who’s boss, who’s bigger.

He grabs Aiden by the arm in a flash of anger and drags him up the stairs. The boy screams and flails, but that doesn’t deter Joel. He brings him to the room he assumes is his, the walls covered in sports posters and memorabilia.

“Take off your shirt,” he growls, a familiar fury pounding inside his chest.

When Aiden protests, Joel does it for him, ripping the kid’s shirt nearly in half. Rage floods through Joel’s veins and he can’t exactly place why, but the feeling is very real and bouldering through him at an alarming speed. He knows this feeling, feels strangely at home there.

He undoes his belt and brings the leather end down on Aiden’s back, not the buckle like his father used to do. Joel does have some decency buried deep in his chest. And then he loses himself to the unyielding anger.

“You get ten,” he snarls. “Don’t you lay a hand on your sister again. Is that understood? Now you answer to me.”

No response except for a scream.

“I said , do you understand?” Joel roars, bringing down the belt.

Rage consumes him like a drug. He barely registers what he’s doing. The belt goes down again and again. And somehow, through the screaming and the pain, and the intoxicating feeling of being completely in control for once, Joel’s line of vision wanders to the bedroom door. In all the excitement, it was left ajar and out in the hallway, sitting on her knees is Y/N. Joel immediately expects fear, despair, revulsion. When Tommy would watch him take a beating his face would betray the most acute sense of hopelessness and terror and the waterworks would begin. But Y/N just stares at him unflinchingly, at what he’s doing. She doesn’t cry, she simply sees. Too much for a child, and yet, she watches. She does not intervene, doesn’t even try to. And for the tiniest moment, her and Joel’s eyes connect, and he feels a sense of calm, of comprehension, of recognition in that uncannily knowing gaze. Her irises sparkle and Joel feels…something that he cannot entirely articulate. Seen? Accepted? Understood? Joel knows logically what he is doing is an ugly, vile thing — he has never claimed to be a good man. Practical maybe, but never good. And yet, Y/N sees it — sees him — and she doesn’t look away. She cocks her head slightly, and images of Tommy grimacing in revulsion and fear as Joel mercilessly beat up their childhood neighborhood bullies to the point of unconsciousness pop into his mind, of the haunting look in his brother’s eyes. Even Sarah could not stomach his violent heart when she witnessed him beat up some pervert with a camera that had looked at her funny at the mall. Even though it was for her — to keep her safe. She had stared at him in disgust and pity. She had not seen him then at all.

But now, looking at Y/N, for the briefest moment, Joel can swear he sees something resembling a smile flicker over her serious face. And though it goes as quickly as it comes, he feels the familiar sensation gnawing at the bottom of his stomach: primal and untameable, soft and vulnerable, but fierce and loud at the same time. He feels an inexorable, inescapable sense of care and devotion to this child. But most of all, because she sees him, truly sees him, and does not turn away in disgust, Joel Miller feels the gut-wrenching, unquenchable sensation of love deep in his chest. For the first time since Sarah died on that hospital bed, weak and unwell from the chemo he could not afford, he feels alive . 

***

Things fall into a tentative routine. Every morning, Joel wakes up in bed beside Erica. They fuck the night before more often than not, but always in that same slow way that doesn’t do much for Joel. It’s enough to get off, sure, she isn’t an unattractive woman, but he’s mostly there for the meal ticket and roof over his head. He goes to work at the auto-body repair shop, Erica goes to her job at her law firm. The kids ride the bus to school. He gets home in the evenings before Erica and spends time coexisting with the children. Usually, he kicks back on the sofa, rubbing his sore back, and watches television, minding his own business. Aiden mostly avoids him, doing god knows what in his room. He bullies his sister cruelly and Joel punishes him when he sees fit. Erica knows what he does to Aiden and either doesn’t care or approves. He never lays a hand on Y/N though. She warms up to him slowly, cautiously. Most evenings she sits on the far end of the couch and Joel on the other, but as she gets used to him and sees that he’s not a threat, at least to her, she scoots closer. 

The children’s father is no longer in their lives from what Joel can tell, which is perfectly fine with him. When Joel’s heart does not feel full of lead, he plays the guitar. Y/N sits and watches him. She is a quiet child, but unrelentingly brave. When Joel lets the TV blare, he rarely cares to pay much attention these days, she stays and watches with him, no matter what is on and never complains or asks to change the channel. Blockbuster zombie apocalypse movie? She watches. News special on America’s most dangerous serial killers? She watches. Documentary on venomous snakes? She watches. Should Joel be letting her watch this crap? Who the fuck knows? He isn’t her father. And plus, he won’t admit this to anyone, hardly even himself, but he likes having some company. It makes everything feel…less. And he likes that she doesn’t try to make him speak. Sometimes there are no words and he thinks Y/N understands this. Unlike Erica who yaps every second of the day. But Joel stays polite and plays along. He has to.

But he will not lie, Aiden gets on his very last nerve. There is something that Joel cannot quite place that makes him feel like he has known this boy his whole life even though they are as familiar as perfect strangers. All siblings fight and rough-house. That is normal. Hell, he and Tommy used to fight rough and tumble all the time. But the way Aiden bullies Y/N is something else entirely. And most times, it is unprovoked. And he is so much bigger than she is, growing bigger by the day. 

Joel’s beatings have not stopped Aiden’s anger and sadistic attitudes, but they do make sure that he takes some kind of physical consequence for his crimes. It makes Joel feel better and he thinks it makes Y/N feel better too. And some days he gets so fucking mad at Aiden that he thinks not even god could stop his wrath even if the boy turned into Mother Theresa herself! Okay, maybe that’s extreme, but another part of Joel thinks maybe it’s not. The truth is, though he is loathe to admit it, some days, he is not in control of his anger. Some days he punches so hard, his knuckles bleed and he has to stop for a second to come back to himself. Others he goes so roughly on Aiden that he causes the kid to become bloody and he feels ashamed of what he’s done. But there are other days, very dark days, where he wishes he could do it over and over again. He convinces himself he’s doing it for Y/N and not some other sinister ulterior motive he does not care to dwell on…

One night, a few months into Joel’s new living arrangements, he walks through the upstairs hallway to his and Erica’s bedroom, passing the closed door to the bathroom that the kids share. He has done this what feels like a thousand times before and doesn’t think anything of it until he stops and realizes he hears Y/N singing. 

♪“ Someday, my pain / Someday, my pain will mark / You…”♫ she sings softly.

He can barely hear it over the crash of the water from her shower, but her voice is beautiful. It pulls at Joel’s shrunken heart, deep inside his long-dead chest. Her voice has an eerie quality to it too, almost haunting. He’s not sure of what song it is, but he finds himself wanting to know. Eventually, she stops, and Joel goes to bed, but her voice echoes in his mind for hours as he lies awake in the dark.

The next day, Joel is sitting on the couch when the kids get home from school. Y/N joins him on the other side of the sofa as usual. They watch reruns of some unfunny family sitcom.

“Heard you singing last night,” he finally grunts unceremoniously.

Y/N goes very still.

“Sorry,” she mumbles, avoiding his gaze. “I’ll be quieter next time.”

Joel looks over at her. He realizes she looks terrified.

“Ain’t no problem with it,” he tries to explain, confused. “Thought you sounded nice is all.”

“You tryna trick me?” she stammers, tears collecting in her shimmering eyes.

“What? Trick you? What you crying for, honey? You didn’t do anything wrong.”

Joel is genuinely flabbergasted. 

Tears trickle down her cheeks. What has he done this time? he wonders. But he is concerned more than anything. Hell, he hasn’t seen her cry like this since the day they met. Not even last week when Aiden slammed her head into the metal oven in the kitchen (luckily it was off or Joel would have really killed him that time).  

She sniffles, looking conflicted, then collects herself as best she can manage.

“M-my dad didn’t like when I would sing. ‘Specially if he was in a depo…I forget the word…deponition? Deposition? When he was on the phone for work, I mean. If I was being too loud. Or too shrill. He didn’t like that one bit. He’d get mad…” she trails off. 

“The way Aiden gets mad?” Joel asks very slowly, not truly wanting to know the answer.

“Yeah,” she nods after a while. “Except he’s a lot bigger. And stronger. He…he broke my arm once. But it was on accident I think. He got me ice cream after.”

Anger, red and hot, pulses through Joel’s veins. What hadn’t this child endured at the hands of angry men? 

“What did your mother do?” he bites out, almost unnaturally calm from trying to control himself.

“Well, most of the time he’d kinda like hit her around, I guess? But the time he broke my arm was the time she made him leave for good and they got a divorce and all. Aiden says it’s my fault he won’t come around anymore. He was so mad. He loves Dad so much. I don’t understand it though because even though Dad likes him a lot more than me, Dad would still be so mean to him sometimes. Mom says I don’t even know all of it...Promise I won’t bother you with singing though, okay?”

“Sweetheart,” Joel says as softly as his blinding rage will permit. Somehow, when he’s with Y/N, he finds he can control himself better. “I’ll never get mad at you for singing. Or being too loud. Or anything. Never gonna put my hands on you. I’m sorry if what I do to Aiden scares you or made you think that I would ever do such a thing to you.”

“It doesn’t scare me,” she shakes her head. “When you get rough with Aiden, you do it because he did really bad, to protect me. It’s like with you there’s rules that make sense. Aiden chooses to be mean and violent so you choose it back to him. With my dad, it was different. It was like I could breathe wrong and I’d get in trouble. Get in trouble for things I couldn’t control or help. Sometimes I did bad, I know I did, but I also know there were other times where I wasn’t hurting anyone and he’d still hurt me so badly. My dad never got mad at Aiden for hurting me though. He thought it was funny, I think. Sometimes he’d kinda like sick him on me. Kinda how you could a dog.”

Joel doesn’t know how to respond, doesn’t know the right words. He figures he can only show her with his actions who he is and she will just have to learn to trust him. If her father ever enters the house though, he will wring his neck. That’s for certain. Thank God he doesn’t come around for his sake, Joel’s, and the family’s.

“I was just thinking,” Joel finally says. “If ya want, I could learn how to play that song you were singing on my guitar and maybe you could sing it for me sometime?”

“M-maybe we could sing it together?” Y/N asks tentatively, her eyes wide. “Singing in front of other people is kinda scary.”

“I haven’t sung in a while,” Joel sighs. “Might be rusty.” 

“That’s okay,” she grins hopefully. 

Joel wants to take a photo of that rare sight and keep it close for as long as he lives, torn in his pocket or snug in his wallet, he doesn’t care. 

“Joel?” she asks a little cautiously, breaking him from his thoughts. “Can I ask you something?”

“‘Course, kiddo,” he says as gently as he knows how.

“Who’s Sarah?”

His heart stops. His blood runs cold. 

“What? How did you–”

“You were talking. In your sleep yesterday,” she says, shrinking away a little and Joel feels sorry for scaring her again. “When we were watching Dexter . Well, you fell asleep right before. You were snoring and all, but you were also talking and mumbling that name. You sounded sad and scared.”

Joel should definitely not have allowed her to watch that! But that is hardly the point right now. 

His heart squeezes so tight it burns. What was there to say about Sarah – the entire reason his life had had any purpose? His perfect babygirl? The light of his life? 

He could lie. So easily too and Y/N would never know. He could say nothing at all. Hasn’t even told Erica about her yet. Hardly ever speaks to anyone about her these days.

And yet…

“She was my daughter,” he hears himself say softly. “She…got sick. Died of leukemia a while back. She was twelve.”

He reaches into his pocket and pulls out the wallet he was just thinking about. Inside is a tiny school photo of Sarah – the last one she ever took. It’s faded a little, but she’s still smiling so big she could block out the sun. He shows it to Y/N.

“I’m sorry, Joel,” she says and she really does look sorry. 

Not the way his co-workers and customers say it – almost as a reflex – to fill the void in the conversation. Her eyes are shimmering.  

“Nothin’ to do about it now,” he shrugs, running his thumb over the photo paper, softened with age. “But she was so damn special. My whole world.”

He has learned to repress the tears, not to show weakness, that is not hard. Not anymore. But the anger that broils up inside him – the injustice of it all – how he was unable to help her. Unable to save her. He feels almost like a child again, powerless in an unforgiving, unrelenting world. He wants to fight back!

He is so angry he begins to shake and his hands clench into fists. 

He wants to flip over the fucking coffee table – fling it across the room! He wants to punch in the glass of the flickering TV screen until his fist is broken! He wants to–He wants–

He just wants his babygirl back…

A sob, small and foreign rises in his throat, but he pushes it down. 

He thinks Y/N knows though. Can see the vulnerability in his eyes.

She reaches out a small hand and touches his fist, pushes it down gently into the soft fabric of the couch so he’ll stop shaking. It doesn’t entirely work, but he thinks he appreciates the effort.

“I don’t know if this is the right thing to say,” she begins a bit skittishly, still not entirely trusting the hulking, raging man above her. “But I think I would have liked to have been her friend.”

And for the first time since Sarah died, Joel sobs . 

Y/N pops up from the couch and Joel’s heart cries out louder in his chest for her to come back, don’t leave me too as he tries to suck the tears back in. It doesn’t work though and liquid gushes down his cheeks. He doesn’t think he can take the rejection, the loss of her. But thankfully, she returns just as quickly as she went with a handful of tissues stuffed into her small fist. 

“Here, Joel,” she offers. “Here. Don’t cry.”

Joel does cry though. He’s ashamed he’s broken down in front of this literal child, and he doesn’t let out much noise, but he doesn’t take the tissues either. He can’t. 

She’s so sweet though, or maybe it’s because she is truly afraid of him now, of his wrath, he’ll never really know, but she frowns and reaches out a little hand, the one with the scar on the middle finger, and tries to wipe up the tears.

The paper of the tissue tickles his cheeks.

“Shouldn’t havta…” he tries.

“Didn’t mean to make you…” she answers.

A pause.

“You didn’t, honey. That was all me,” he assures her finally.

She lets out a sigh of relief and soaks up the last of the salt water from his face, brushes the tissue gently against his nose. It tickles, causes him to snort. He smirks a little.

She smiles back shyly, she can’t help it, he can tell. 

“You know,” he says thoughtfully after a few moments of silence, sighing deeply. “I reckon she would’ve wanted to be your friend too…”

***

A few months roll by. Things are virtually the same except Y/N seems more comfortable around him now. Maybe it’s because she saw his weakness up close and personal, his Achilles heel —— knows how to coax it out of him now if she has to. Or maybe it’s because she truly trusts him. Whatever the case, she sits closer to him on the couch now, still giving him a respectful foot of distance though of course. 

Once in a blue moon, she sings for him and he tries to keep up with the lilting sound of her high voice. She says she likes his low, deep voice just fine, it’s just she still gets nervous singing in front of other people so it’s still a rare occasion. His favorite is when she sings solo and he gets to strum along for her and really listen. Sometimes her voice cracks in a very specific way that some might find to be a flaw, but Joel would never. 

Aiden makes fun of them and calls them the ‘Von Trapp Family Singers.’ Are they a family? Joel wonders.

One day after work, Joel goes to the library to find some sheet music for a song Y/N likes. She treasures the photo-copied paper like a gift as Joel deciphers the notes he can actually read for her. She color-codes each one carefully in magic marker so she can remember the differences between them. 

The next day, Aiden burns it up with a lighter he has acquired from God knows where. Joel confiscates it – the last thing he needs is this particular child setting fires – and It doesn’t end well for Aiden. He limps for damn near a week. But some days, when Aiden is calm, he joins Y/N and Joel in front of the TV if a sports game is on. He doesn’t sit on the couch though, just the floor. He doesn’t say much to them but does get invested in the good and bad plays of each game, gets sore if his team is losing. On one particularly good day, when the Rangers hit a grand slam, and Joel was actually paying attention, he and Aiden actually high-five.  

Things are going…well? Is that the right word? It is a foreign concept for Joel. For Christmas, he gets Y/N guitar, Aiden a book on boxing so maybe he will redirect his anger into somewhere productive, and Erica a spa-day kit for 20% off that he saw at CVS (he never claimed to know what women want). Aiden is neutral, surprised, he thinks, that Joel even got him a present. Erica is actually appreciative and returns the favor with some new socks and underwear. 

“A practical gift for a practical man,” she says, kissing him on the forehead. 

Joel supposes he appreciates the gesture. 

Y/N, though, is thrilled.

“Thank you, Joel! Got you something too,” she says excitedly, bouncing up and down in her red and white pajamas.

“That’s not necessary,” Joel chides, leaning over to pick up the wrapping paper that was strewn across the living room floor. 

But secretly he is curious. He didn’t think she even had any money of her own…

Aiden opens the cover of the boxing book with disinterest, eyeing the new guitar distastefully. 

Y/N jumps up, leaves the room, and returns with a small plastic baggie in her hands. Inside are little, different bits of colored plastic clumsily and haphazardly cut into tiny, sharp-looking, badge-shaped pieces. One he recognizes is from the top of a yogurt container he put into the recycling the other day, another one from the top of a Gatorade bottle. 

“Here ya go!” 

She shoves the plastic bag into his large hands enthusiastically.

“Thank you,” Joel responds, still unsure what he was given.

It reminds him of when Sarah was young and would come home with some sort of abstract macaroni painting from kindergarten and he would nod and smile knowingly when she explained that of course it was Two dinosaurs getting married, Dad. Duh!

“You could try one on my new guitar,” she offers, a little disappointed when he doesn’t have more of a reaction. “You said you lost most of yours…”

Joel immediately feels guilty and then it clicks. She tried to make him guitar picks! His heart clenches with emotion he can not quite identify. 

He pulls a little orange one out of the bag and accidentally nicks the edge of his finger. Because of the way it was cut, no doubt with uncoordinated child’s hands and a pair of scissors, the edges are much too sharp to serve as an actual guitar pick without damaging guitar strings or apparently Joel’s finger. Dumb kid. But he’s beyond honored anyone would take the time to do such a thoughtful thing for him. 

He hisses softly and sucks the blood off his finger.

“Oops,” she says, horrified. “Shoot. Sorry, I–”

“‘S no trouble,” he interjects dismissively. “Love ‘em. Was my fault anyway. I’mma be honest with you though, sweetheart; don’t think the guitar strings can handle these babies.”

“Oh,” she says softly, trying to keep the disappointment out of her voice. “Oh, yeah, okay...”

She deflates, looking down at the carpet.

Joel selfishly lets her be sad for a beat before swooping back in to be the one to save the day.

“But here’s what I’ll do…”

She looks back up at him with an intoxicating kind of hope in her eyes.

He takes his wallet out of his back pocket and slips the orange pick into the photo slot next to the picture of Sarah. He returns the wallet back into his pants. 

Y/N positively beams. Brighter than the sun, even, Joel thinks.

Aiden yawns purposefully loudly and rolls his eyes. Erica looks touched and maybe even a little proud of her choice in men. But Joel didn’t do it for them. The only reaction in the world he cares about is hers.

Y/N is still grinning, bouncing on the balls of her feet again. But then she does something new: she leans in and hugs him, wrapping her little arms around his waist, burying her face in his flannel shirt, pressing against his tummy.

The world stops for Joel. 

At first, he just hangs there limply, awkwardly. Literally forgets what one is supposed to do in such a situation, but then instinct kicks in and he wraps his arms around her too and squeezes ever so slightly. It’s a more cautious hug than Sarah would have given him – she would have squeezed him half to death – but Y/N is still holding him. Someone small and warm is holding onto him for the first time in what feels like an eternity. And just like that his past is rhyming with his present and it is the most beautiful sound Joel Miller has ever heard. 

Joel Miller is not a good man, no, but maybe, just maybe, he thinks he could be one for Y/N. 

***

Joel tries to be good. He does. His first order of business is stop beating on Aiden – especially in front of Y/N. No amount of violence towards the kid seems to do any good anyway – he still hurts her. And Joel is sick of bandaging her up and wiping the blood from her cheeks; something has to change. Not that he wouldn’t do it a thousand times if he had to. He’d do anything for the girl, that he is sure of. And the truth is, Aiden is close to getting big enough to really fight back. And Joel knows if Aiden really lays a hand on him, he’s not sure he will be able to control himself enough to not inflict permanent damage. And he doesn’t want that. Truly.

So at first, Joel thinks about having Erica send him away to a wilderness camp for troubled children or some such program he sees mentioned on reruns of Dr. Phil. She has the money to do it too. But she won’t send him away. She refuses, loves him too much. Protecting Y/N seems as far down on her list of priorities as ever. She is useless at disciplining him, always has been, so it is up to Joel to find another solution. So the next thing he tries is to set the boy up in boxing classes. This is risky since it might just teach him new ways to hurt Y/N, but at least it will be a place to direct his anger.

It works for a while, to his and Y/N’s immense relief, but that leaves Joel nowhere to take out his anger. He tries to ignore it at first and shove it down, but it starts to come out in little ways. At work, he barks at a customer who locks his keys in the car he’s trying to fix. At home, he shouts at Erica for missing Y/N’s school play. The rage leaks out of him, pours off his entire being. He tries jerking off more to increasingly violent porno magazines to calm himself down since Erica is sure not satisfying him. It doesn’t do enough though, not really. Finally, he tries boxing at the local gym himself, but it is not enough either. Boxing has rules. The first sorry sucker he gets in the ring with, he beats to the point of unconsciousness. Two men have to pull him off to get him to stop. They kick him out immediately.

So Joel tries going to the bar after work with the guys from the shop and drinking a little to take the edge off. That actually helps somewhat. He’s careful about it, never comes home drunk, never drinks in front of Erica or the kids. But what helps the most are the bar fights. He’s careful about that too. Only fights the assholes, which there are many of. Switches up the bars he goes to. But some motherfucker slaps a girl's ass without permission? Joel’s on him in seconds, watching like a predator from the shadows. Some dude throws a drink in the bartender’s face? Joel clobbers him half to death. And sometimes? People in the bar applaud him, even cheer him on. It’s probably because they’re intoxicated, but that’s how he justifies it to himself like he’s some kind of goddamn vigilante. Deep down he knows he is something much, much uglier. But at least he’s not doing it to Aiden, a child. And more importantly, at least it is away from Y/N.

***

One day, Y/N falls sick. It starts out as what seems like a cold with a nasty cough. Kids are little germ factories, Joel knows that. He tells himself it is nothing to worry about – that all kids get sick sometimes. The first few days she lies on the couch like a zombie, coughing incessantly into her elbow and sleeping a lot. She snores ever so slightly which he finds charming. Joel stays home from work with her because Erica has to be in court and they watch lots of nature documentaries and daytime talk shows. 

Then the coughing gets worse and Joel’s brain stops functioning properly and he has trouble explaining why. He feels more on edge, more agitated. Erica takes Y/N to the doctor and comes back with a diagnosis: walking pneumonia. Nothing too serious, lots of kids get it. She is prescribed antibiotics and is supposed to drink lots of fluids and wait it out. But when Erica tells Joel the news of what the doctor told her he is holding a glass of water and it shatters in his large hand, cutting the skin of his middle finger.

“Fuck!” he yells. 

And he cannot articulate precisely why, but he feels good that there is a justified reason to yell. 

Erica wipes his hand and cleans the glass up.

“Gotta go to court again today, honey,” she says like everything is fine and normal. “Can you look after her today? Call in sick? She’s in bed. Going through it.”

Joel nods and she is gone like this whole thing is nothing. Like her precious, living breathing child is not suffering in the room above his head.

He climbs the stairs and enters Y/N’s room. He doesn’t often spend much time there. The walls are painted pink and differently shaped dolls and stuffed animals line the white vanity across from her canopied bed. He does not think he has ever seen Y/N play with any of those specific toys, come to think of it, or express any interest in the color pink (no doubt Erica’s secret passion for interior design rearing its ugly head). He vows silently, one day, to paint the walls any color she wants. 

But there she is, sprawled out in her bed coughing a nasty cough. Something shifts inside Joel at the sound. She looks unwell and weak and so small. 

“Hey, honey,” he says softly, almost robotically. 

Something is not right. He sits on the edge of her bed, feels her burning forehead. He takes her temperature gently with the thermometer that goes in her ear. He feels that weird sensation like he’s been here before even though he has hardly ever entered her bedroom. One hundred and four degrees Fahrenheit it reads when it beeps. Joel swallows a lump in his throat that he didn’t realize was there.  

She coughs pathetically. She looks out of it, her eyes far away. Joel’s heart throbs painfully.

Y/N is mumbling something incoherent now. Joel leans a little closer so he can decipher the words.

He makes out something like: No, Dad. Don’t. Stop, please. Please, not tonight. 

Joel stops breathing. 

She must be delirious from the fever. 

And then she’s crying. Quietly, but crying all the less. And this time, unlike every time he has seen her tears before, she sobs. Actually makes noise, her chest wracked with it. 

Then she coughs so hard she starts to wheeze and it hits Joel so ferociously he practically loses his grip on reality.

When Sarah was sick she had leukemia, a blood cancer. And cancer requires treatment. Expensive treatment. But of course, Joel hadn’t cared. He would have sold every item he owned to save his child, would have traveled to the ends of the earth if he had to, done literally any and everything in his power to protect her. So he paid for most of her chemotherapy with high hopes. Desperate hopes, but high ones. It had been her best shot at getting better according to the doctors. And the thing about chemo is, the side effects can literally be deadly. Joel is not a man of science, but the doctor explained that those drugs kill the bad cells that make up the cancer, but also the good ones. It fucks with your immune system, weakens you. Makes you lose your hair, vomit, and or be so weak you can barely walk. All that happened to Sarah. Joel felt like a traitor taking her to those treatments. Logically, he knew they were necessary, but he always felt like he was the one doing those awful things to her. It eviscerated him, left him raw and empty, and helpless like a child.

But in the end, it was the pneumonia that killed her. Her body couldn’t fight it off. She’d died in a hospital bed, Joel at her side, holding her hand, unable to do a single damned thing except scream .

Y/N coughs again, simultaneously pulling him from his thoughts and throwing him back into them. His heart is pounding in his chest to Do something! But there is nothing to be done, nothing he can do! Why can’t he ever seem to protect her?

She looks up just then, notices him for the first time since he entered the room, still crying feebly.

“He hurt me,” she whispers up at him, her eyes glazed over and glistening with tears. She reaches out for a handful of his dark blue work shirt and pulls it tightly to her. “He hurt me. And I couldn’t–I c-couldn’t…”

And then he is holding her, not quite sure how, but he is holding her trembling body to his chest and he will not let her go. Not for the world, not for anyone. He will not lose this child. He wraps his arms around her, holds tight. He will keep her safe, no matter the cost. 

“It’s okay, babygirl,” he whispers. “I got you.”

***

Joel and Erica get married that spring. They agree on a private ceremony in front of a judge with only Y/N and Aiden in attendance. When Aiden hears the news, he throws a fit, He breaks dishes and punches a hole in the TV set which sets Joel’s teeth on edge. But Y/N is overjoyed. In the end, he and Joel adorn what Joel considers monkey suits and Erica wears a beautiful white dress that accentuates her figure. Y/N wears a frilly pink dress and carries a basket of pink roses. Joel never thought he’d be a married man and yet here he is. He imagines Sarah in attendance too and his heart aches. This is his life now. 

He refuses to wear a ring.

***

Time passes. Long stretches of time where things feel–dare he think it–normal.

 Aiden doesn’t beat Y/N, but begins to get into fights at school. Joel saves his violence for the bar scene which he begins frequenting more often. 

Erica starts working later, gets promoted in her job. Fucks Joel less and less, not that he cares very much. 

Joel goes to back-to-school nights and family cookouts. He teaches Y/N to play the guitar and how to fix car motors. In both these activities, she is no natural, but she tries her best and listens well. She smiles more than he’s ever seen. He drives her to sleepovers and Aiden to boxing practice. He paints her bedroom walls orange.

Things feel stable.

Two Christmases pass.

And then things take a downturn.

***

One evening, Joel returns home from work later than usual. When he arrives home in his truck, he notices an expensive sports car in the driveway. Erica has affluent friends, sure, but he’s never seen this particular car before. Something about that doesn’t sit right with him.

He opens the front door with a creak and Erica intercepts him before he can make it to the dining room table for dinner. She presses a hand to his forearm bulking with muscle.

“Don’t freak out,” she whispers urgently. 

Joel stops and hears the sounds of people eating dinner and a man’s raspy voice speaking.

“Freak out about what?”

He makes his way past her to the dining room. He sees a man he does not immediately recognize sitting at the head of the table, Y/N is flanking one side of the table next to him and Aiden the other. He is conventionally handsome and wearing an expensive pinstripe suit. When he looks up, he smirks at Joel. Joel thinks he looks kind of like Aiden if you were to squint. And then he understands who he is.

“The fuck are you doing in my house?” he growls, lunging forward.

“ Your house?” the man smirks again, unflinching. 

He looks Joel over, examining his mechanic’s uniform, the grease stain on Joel’s cheek. 

Erica grabs Joel. She pulls him back out into the hallway.

“Tell him he’s not welcome here,” Joel snarls, trying to get a look at the man over Erica’s shoulder. 

She pushes him backward gently. Instantly, he is worried for Y/N, for all intents and purposes alone in there with the man who abused her and this entire goddamn family for that matter. He catches a glance at her and she looks terrified . Aiden, conversely, Joel sees, looks like he just won the lottery, staring up at his dad in adoration. Joel doesn’t think he has ever seen him look so happy.

“This is important to them,” Erica snaps quietly. “That’s their father. He has a right–”

“Get him out of here or I’ll kill him,” Joel says deadly quietly. “He what? Doesn’t show up for over three years and you think that–”

“I know that he has a right to speak to them. I am their mother and they need a sense of closure. Aiden needs this. So you will sit down at that table and have an amicable dinner or so help me God, Joel.”

Erica never speaks to him like this. He is shocked.

“Fine,” he snarls after a while, his chest heaving. 

He can hardly think straight while Y/N is in there alone with that excuse for a man. Better he be close to protect her instead of thrown out of the house.

He walks back in with Erica, who sits next to Y/N, leaving Joel nowhere to go but next to Aiden.

“I’m Derek,” the children’s father says, leaning over the food Erica has prepared to shake Joel’s hand. 

Joel doesn’t take it.

“And you must be Joe? The new husband.”

“Joel,” he replies shortly.

He looks over at Y/N who is trying to be brave, he can tell, but deep in her eyes, looks petrified.

They eat dinner in tense silence until Derek breaks it and begins bragging about his golf club record, the latest client he’s been representing, his new girlfriend, Sylvia.

“See, she’s helping me become a better man,” Derek insists with a forkful of steak. “I know I haven’t always been…the greatest of fathers or partners, but she really convinced me coming here would be a good thing. That it would be healing. You guys will meet someday, I’m sure.”

Joel leans forward toward Derek, reeling at the idea that this man could possibly be back in the picture of his family’s life, but Erica reaches under the table and squeezes his knee in a death grip and Joel holds himself back.

Aiden hangs on his father’s every word. Erica looks somewhat intrigued after she lets go of her husband’s leg. Y/N screams silently at Joel, who tries his best to communicate without words that he will keep her safe.

“And I know I’ve missed quite a bit,” Derek continues. “Which is why I brought these. Sylvia’s idea, really.”

He reaches down toward his feet and pulls out a fancy golden gift bag and takes out two presents. He hands one to Aiden and the other one to Y/N. Aiden rips his open excitedly. Inside is a hunting knife with a red handle. 

Great, Joel thinks.

Y/N doesn’t move though, stopped like a deer in the headlights.

“Open it, girl,” Derek sneers.

She looks over at Joel. 

“Go on, baby,” he says softly, heat pumping through his blood.

She unwraps the pink wrapping paper and finds a Barbie doll in a clear plastic box. Joel has never seen her play with dolls at all come to think of it. 

“Isn’t that thoughtful?” Erica smiles cautiously.

“Thanks, Dad,” Aiden says enthusiastically. “Can’t wait to show the guys at ROTC.”

“Good for you, son,” Derek grins. “Serving our country is the highest of honors.”

Joel suddenly tries not to think about Tommy blasted to bits halfway across the world in Afghanistan, his body in such bad condition all that he got left of his baby brother was a finger and two bent dog tags.  

Aiden beams.

“Well,” Derek barks, eyeing Y/N distastefully. “Aren’t you going to say anything?” he taunts. 

Joel sees where Aiden gets it from. This arrogant, bullying behavior. He shifts in his seat, ready to strike if necessary.

“Thanks,” she says very quietly. 

Derek grins in a kind of satisfaction that makes Joel want to go over there and punch his daylights out. He almost does too until Erica kicks his shin beneath the table and he controls himself. 

Y/N frowns. She looks over at Joel, then back at her father. Something ripples across her face, but it goes so quickly Joel cannot assign any meaning to it. But she looks ever so less scared somehow, more angry almost, but not quite.

And then after about ten minutes of somewhat peaceful eating and Derek making Aiden and Erica laugh with stupid anecdotes from his court cases while Joel and Y/N exchange looks, it happens.

Y/N’s hand reaches forward and knocks against her glass of coke. It goes flying over in Derek’s direction and drenches him in the sticky liquid, staining his suit.

“Sorry, Dad!” she squeaks immediately. “Oh my god, I–”

“You little slut!” he roars in response, almost like a reflex, backhanding Y/N across the face with lightning speed and accuracy. “Do you know how much this fucking suit cost!?”

The force of the blow is so strong it knocks Y/N from her chair onto the ground.

Before a coherent thought can even go through Joel’s head he is on the other man, slamming him up against the wall behind him by the throat.

“Joel, don’t you dare!” Erica yells, but it is too late.

Joel sees red and can’t exactly recall what he does next, but it goes something like this:

He squeezes around Derek’s throat and bangs his head backward against the wall a few times. The other man tries to get a punch in, but Joel ducks and kicks him in the balls. Derek crumples to the ground and Joel gives his chest another hard kick. He whines pathetically. 

Aiden gets up then, but Erica uses all of her strength to pull him back before he can get involved in the mix. He resists, shouts something that Joel cannot make out, but Erica manages to keep him from the two men with a great amount of effort and struggle. 

Derek is on the floor now and Joel is straddling him, landing punch after ruthless punch down onto his head. His nose begins to bleed, but Joel keeps punching. 

“HOW DARE YOU?” he roars down at the trembling, gushing man on the floor.

There is so much blood splurting all over his face, dripping down onto his expensive stained suit, and the floor that Derek almost stops looking like Derek. Joel sees Aiden’s face in his features. And then there is so much blood that it could be anyone’s face screaming back at him for mercy. It could be those creepy, asshole men at the bar. It could be the much bigger kid who always used to beat up Tommy every day in the schoolyard. It could be that damned head doctor who let his babygirl die. It could even be his no-good, bastard, alcoholic papá . 

He turns his head ever so slightly while still delivering punches. Erica has Aiden in a bear hug. She is screaming for Joel to stop. Aiden is bellowing something that sounds like, You bastard, I’ll kill you! Get off of him! I’ll kill you! And then Joel sees Y/N still on the floor from where she was knocked. Her face is still turned in the same direction it was slapped into, but she is not crying or screaming. Her eyes are dancing.

They connect with Joel’s. 

He knows he is supposed to be a good man for her, but she doesn’t seem to mind his deviant behavior. He stops then, though, because otherwise he thinks he will kill the man and he doesn’t want Y/N to experience that. He steals a glance at her again and she looks ever so slightly disappointed, but her wide-eyed expression tells Joel that Christmas has come early this year. She sends him a look of gratitude and Joel thinks that maybe he did act like a good man for her after all in the case of this vile, pathetic person who is supposed to be her father. 

 Finally, Joel stands up. He walks over and reaches out a bloody hand to Y/N and pulls her gently from the ground. Even after she’s standing upright she doesn’t let go of him.

Derek gets up after a while, wiping his sleeve over his face to try to tame the excess blood. Joel thinks that maybe he broke the man’s nose. He feels not a shred of remorse. The other man spits on the ground at Joel’s feet and leaves without saying goodbye to his ex-wife or children, slamming the front door behind him.  

Erica is not pleased with Joel’s behavior. Aiden is shouting and screaming. He breaks a plate by throwing it onto the floor with a loud crash. Joel leans over and grabs the knife his father gave him and sticks it in his front pocket so Aiden doesn’t feel tempted to use it. Y/N’s small hand is still in his. 

When Aiden is coherent enough to listen to instructions and all screamed out, Erica sends the children upstairs to bed. 

Joel tries to walk Y/N up to bed to tuck her in, but Erica stops him.

“ Not you,” she growls at Joel. 

She is livid in a way Joel has never seen before. For a moment, he seriously wonders if this is the end of their relationship. 

The kids scamper upstairs and Erica yells at Joel for ages. 

At a certain point, he stops listening. He doesn’t try to argue back. Doesn’t care to. He is actually calm now, though his chest is still heaving from the exertion, more calm than he’s been in ages. He knows that she will never understand why he had to do what he did to Derek. She lives in another reality where his violence is not acceptable if she has to bear witness to it. She doesn’t care about Y/N the way she is supposed to. Never has. Doesn’t know or see her. Not the way Joel does. Has too big a soft spot for Aiden. Tolerated Joel’s violence toward him though like a coward. Maybe deep down she knew he needed some kind of discipline? But when Joel lays a hand on her scumbag of an ex-husband that’s what’s too far? When he hurt her own daughter? When Joel himself was responsible for hurting her own precious son? Where was her outrage then? 

But he voices none of this. Pushes it down. He cannot lose her. Not this house, not the kids, not the financial security. Never Y/N. 

Erica banishes him to the couch for the first time in their relationship. Joel doesn’t mind. 

Hours later, late into the night, he hears soft footsteps walking down the stairs. He rolls over on the sofa to see who is approaching. He wonders if it is Erica there to apologize because he knows her well enough to know by now that she will forgive him eventually. She will forgive anything it seems. But it is not Erica at all.

“Joel?” a little voice asks quietly. “You up?”

“Yeah, baby,” he replies. “You okay? I’m so sorry he pulled that shit on you.”

Y/N shrugs. 

“Sorry I…I didn’t stop it before it happened,” he admits like a secret. 

She shrugs again.

“‘M sorry she made you sleep on the couch and all,” she replies.

“‘S no trouble. I don’t mind.”

“But it’s my fault you got in trouble in the first place.”

“Y/N, you ain’t done nothing wrong,” Joel tells her seriously. 

It’s hard to see her in the dark, but he thinks she’s grimacing guiltily. 

“I just wanted to say…” she begins hesitantly. “Thanks for like sticking up for me and all that. You…you’re the only one who does.”

Joel hides a smile from his babygirl. Something inside him likes being that person for her, he cannot lie to himself. Likes being the one she can count on. 

“You were like some MMA fighter,” she continues. “But then all the blood was like in The Shining .”

One day, not long ago, Joel had fallen asleep on the couch when The Shining came on and Y/N had watched the entire thing out of her own free will. That movie had frightened the shit out of him as a kid!

“I’m sorry if I scared you, sweetheart.”  

“You didn’t,” Y/N replies matter-of-factly.  “I wasn’t scared of what you did for a second…I know that’s messed up, but I kinda wanted you to…” 

She trails off.

Joel understands. 

“I kinda, please don’t get mad, but I sorta knocked the cup over on purpose,” she admits.

Joel’s eyebrows go way up on his forehead in surprise.

“It’s just,” she babbles quickly in self-defense. “Mom and Aiden were like giggling and hanging onto every dumb thing he said and it scared me. I thought they might let him keep coming around and start liking him again. And I also knew he hadn’t changed too. I could tell on account of how he was looking at me in that same mean way he always did. And I also knew you’d save me like you always do and you had this angry look in your eyes. I knew what you would do. I could feel it in my gut…”

“You little shit!” Joel smirks. 

He has to give her credit where credit was due – that was incredibly shrewd. Dangerous, but oh so clever. She played everyone in that room like a fiddle. Joel is honestly kind of proud.

“You mad?” she asks tentatively, biting her bottom lip.

“Nah,” Joel grins. “At you? Never. You shouldn’t have had to let him hurt you to get him away from you, but you protected yourself and that’s the most important thing. If I had to do it over, I would.”

Y/N smiles. 

She’s a fucked up little girl, but Joel is a fucked up man, and they both live in a fucked up world.

“Got your back,” he grunts. “Remember that. Now scurry along back to bed and get some rest.”

“G’night, Joel.”

*** 

Time passes. 

Erica forgives Joel of course and Derek never comes around again. 

Y/N and Aiden grow bigger. 

They go on camping trips and Joel teaches Y/N and Aiden how to fish. Never thought he would see the day where Aiden was willingly listening to his instructions, but the day comes anyway. Of course, the boy’s favorite part is cutting up the bloody fish guts like Joel’s used to be as a child. Y/N likes the part where you wait for the fish to bite. She sits next to Joel on the grassy river bank, the sun shining down on the lazy lake they are camping by, and smiles softly to herself.

Another two Christmases pass.

All the while, Joel is visiting the bar more and not necessarily to drink. His violent streak is getting worse somehow. He thinks, though he’s no goddamn shrink, that it might have something to do with the fact that he and Erica are not having any sex. Their relationship is still amicable and she is still sweet to him, and he tries his best to be to her too, but in the bedroom is mostly crickets. Joel jerks off, of course he does, but his fist is no substitute for a warm body. 

Joel causes such a scene at the bar he frequents the most, that the cops have to be called. He ditches the place before he can get arrested, but he’s getting worried about his behavior. Something must change.

So then come the women. They practically throw themselves at him. Never has he thought he was that attractive until women literally offer themselves up to him on a silver platter after saving them from some drunken creep. Joel had always declined until now. But Joel is only a man. He fucks them rough and dirty (with their permission of course – Joel is not a good man, and a lot of things, but he isn’t a fucking rapist) in the bathroom stalls, in the alleyways. In the moment it feels good and helps him let off some steam, but after he feels guilty. And it doesn’t satisfy him much more than with Erica if he really thinks about it. One thing that Erica has over these women who let him act out his violent self is the look of devotion in her eyes. That’s always the thing that gets Joel to cum in the end when he does get to fuck her.

 He would leave her, she isn’t that special to him if he’s honest, but she offers him a twofold sense of stability he has never known in his life. The first fold is the financial stability that has evaded him all of his days. The second is the feeling of family . Something so mundane and normal. And despite her flaws, she treats him so well – better than Sarah’s mother ever did. And most importantly, he doesn’t think he could leave Y/N. Not now. Not when she looks at him like he is the universe. Not even Aiden whom Joel has (begrudgingly) begun to see the traces of himself in. 

***

This particular muggy, summer day begins normally. Joel goes to work, fixes a Chevy Impala’s fluid tank. And then he walks in with an old, beat-up Honda Accord. 

His name is David, and Joel has heard of him through murmurings and bar stories and whispers at community barbeques. He’s a notorious neighborhood legend, whose house kids cross the street to avoid. He is the boogeyman at the end of the cul-de-sac. 

The story is, though through the many versions Joel has heard some of the details get muddled, that he kidnapped and raped a twelve-year-old girl (that part all versions agree on). Some say he was supposed to have ten years in prison, others say twenty, but whatever the number he got out in one for ��good behavior.” In jail, he supposedly devoted his life to God and became a preacher.

Joel doesn’t want to help him, but his boss hisses at him that money is money and he’s going to serve the man whether Joel likes it or not. 

There’s something wrong with the exhaust pipe, so Joel bends down and takes a look at it. He opens the trunk and sees a box of Bibles next to a plastic bag of zip ties. His blood runs cold.

“The fuck is this shit doing in your car?” he growls, referring to the zip ties.

“The Bible is the word of God, Mr. Miller,” David replies, eyeing Joel’s nametag. “Would you like one? I’m always trying to spread The Good Word.” 

“You know that’s not what I’m talking about,” he spits, looking over to make sure his boss is not watching. 

“If you must know, though it’s none of your business, those zip ties are for my garden to help hold up my plants. They are remarkably useful,” David smiles sickeningly politely. 

And that’s when Joel loses it just a little.

He picks up the ties and pockets them.

“Listen here, you pedophile piece of shit,” he snarls. “If I hear about you stepping one goddamned pinky-toe out of line–”

“Hey, Joel!” A little voice calls.

The breath is knocked from Joel’s lungs.

Y/N bounds up to them holding a brown paper bag out of nowhere. 

“You forgot your lunch! Mom dropped me off so you could have it. It’s tuna though. I hate hate tuna. But you’ll eat anything so I hope it’s good for you at least,” she babbles.

“Baby,” Joel says very quietly, his heart thrumming in his ribcage. “Right now’s not a great time. Why don’t you go on home and I’ll catch up with you later?”

Then she notices David. By the fact that she doesn’t immediately leave, Joel determines she has no clue who he is.

“Hello, young lady,” David smiles, eyeing Joel knowingly. “I’m Pastor David.”

“Uh, hi,” she says.

Joel thinks he might actually kill him.

“Would you like something to take home with you?” he asks.

Y/N blinks in confusion as Joel steps in front of her.

“She’ll be going now, won’t you Y/N?” Joel suggests dangerously.

“Here,” David says before she can respond.

He hands her a black-covered bible.

Y/N takes it, looks at the cover, and laughs. Joel and David both look down at her in surprise.

“No offense, ‘Pastor David,”’ she smirks. “But I don’t believe in that shit. Here, you can have it back,” she offers.

He takes back the book somewhat defeatedly. And Joel grins internally.

“Bye, Joel,” she tells him, still smirking. 

She side-hugs him quickly and returns to Erica’s car. 

“How dare you even look at her–” Joel booms at the sad, pathetic excuse for a man once she is out of earshot. 

His hands are clenched into fists and they are shaking. Every part of him is on fire. 

“I think I’ll be going now,” David interjects lightly. “I can see my business isn’t welcome here. You have a beautiful daughter, Mr. Miller. Quite a mouth on her. Shame if something were to happen to her…Oh, the things someone like me could make her believe…”

Joel reaches back his fist to punch, to pummel, to kill, but suddenly, another hand grabs his and holds it in place. Joel’s boss has materialized behind him and is holding him back. Good thing too. It’s probably the only thing that saves Joel’s career and David’s life. 

David winks and drives away as the boss begins to reprimand Joel who is still shaking and fuming.

All he knows is this: If anyone touches his babygirl he will not hesitate to put them six feet under, no matter the cost to himself. He will not hesitate to get blood on his calloused hands. He will not hesitate to kill. And this time? His baby will not sustain a single scratch . He will not wait for her to get hurt before he acts. 

***

Joel wants nothing more than to go home and spend time with his babygirl and wife and even his step-son if he will allow, but there is blood popping and oozing and broiling and churning under his skin like billowing, bubbling lava. If he doesn’t do something about it soon he will explode worse than a volcanic eruption so he heads to the seediest bar he can think of. He makes his way inside and sits right up at the bar, already occupied by a few people. He orders a drink (his usual: whiskey on the rocks) and waits for the impending opportunity for violence he is sure is lying in wait.

He cannot believe the shit that came out of ‘Pastor-fucking-David’s’ sick, perverted mouth and that he almost lost his job over it. He lets that thought charge him up into a rage, his fists clenched so tightly they are beginning to ache in the joints. He cannot believe that disgusting little fucker had the audacity to say that horrible scummy bullshit in his presence when he would do anything to protect that innocent child. He takes a drink of his whiskey and knocks it back in one gulp. He would do anything , ‘Lord’ only knows. He snickers to himself sinisterly. 

And while he’s on the topic, fuck God! When had He ever done a single damn good thing for Joel his entire miserable life except maybe to give him Sarah and then take her away like she was nothing and not the entire light of the universe wrapped into a small, vulnerable person? Joel doesn’t know much about the bible, truth be told, but he remembers a few things from his Sunday school days. He remembers that people are created in the image of God and the stories he remembers most are from the Old Testament which heavily featured a God of absolute rage. Maybe that is the way he is god-like, built of anger and revenge and wrath and the sick, pathetic hunger for power that lurks inside most people. 

But he also remembers Jesus being meek and mild. Joel never understood that desire until he had Sarah and then Y/N in his care. If Joel could snap his fingers and make himself some fundamentally kind and caring man he would, but he can’t. Joel Miller is not a good man. He tried to be for Y/N, he truly did, but look at everything he’s done in the time he’s known her: he used Erica to get financial stability and roof over his head, he’s cheated on her numerous times, he beat Aiden, a child, and everyday the weight of that guilt grows greater as he begins to truly understand how wrong that was, and he beat his babygirl’s pathetic excuse for a father (but still her father) in front of her. He also beat people in bar fights and that time at the gym. And the thing is: is he even a little bit sorry about any of it – except for maybe what he did to Aiden? No, not even a little. And he’d do all of it again if it could mean getting to spend time with his babygirl, Y/N, again. His babygirl who FUCKING DAVID tried to threaten!

And the problem is: who knows what that fucker is capable of? The police and the judicial system let him out after one year which can only be described as a colossal moral failure and a massive miscarriage of justice. It wouldn’t take much for David to really figure out where they lived and grab Y/N and throw her in his trunk like he did that poor other little girl. Maybe that’s paranoid, but Joel knows better than most that when a man wants to do a dark thing he will find a way to do it. Joel does not want to live his life constantly looking over his shoulder as some horrendous pedophile lives freely. 

And then he turns his head to look down at the rest of the fairly busy bar and he sees him . None other than David himself, drinking a beer. Joel cannot believe his luck. It is like all of the light in heaven has aligned to give him such a gift. A part of him is screaming to not engage because Joel is sure he could kill him for what he said about Y/N. But the rest of him is already standing up and grabbing David by the shoulder and–

“If you know what’s good for you, you’ll get the fuck out of here now ,” he snarls. “Almost lost my job because of you, you sick fuck. You’re lucky I give you a warning and don’t wring your neck on the fucking spot.”  

David turns around, Joel’s fingers digging into his shoulder.

“Proverbs 24:1 and 2,” he quotes calmly. “‘Do not envy wicked men or desire their company; for their hearts devise violence, and their lips declare trouble.’”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

“It means perhaps I will be leaving. I don’t care to spend my time with wicked men such as yourself. And I have many preparations to make for what is to come. How is your daughter doing since we last met?”

Joel’s heart runs cold. 

“Get my baby’s name out of your goddamned mouth .” 

“Hope we run into each other soon,” David grins as he gets off the barstool and dislodges himself from Joel’s grip. “There is a lot I could teach her.”

He turns to leave. Disgusting coward, Joel thinks. He could let the man go. But then what? Live in fear of him? Let his precious Y/N live in fear of him? Joel is tired of living in fear, of resigning to a cruel man in a cruel world, and he will never do that or let Y/N do that ever again. 

And then David leans in so close that Joel can smell the alcohol on his breath and the sweat on his skin.

“Can’t stop thinking about her pretty little hands around my–”

Joel doesn’t let him finish. In that moment he knows what will transpire. He picked this seedy-ass bar for a reason: so that no one will bother to stop him.

He lands the first punch with ease, doesn’t even feel the pain till minutes later. The force of the blow to David’s head is so strong he slams down into the ground. It is so violent that David’s eyelid starts to bleed and the skin around the impact spot becomes puffy and dark. 

David shouts for help, but no one in this place gives a fuck and even if they did everybody knows who he is and what he did so they don’t give a shit two times over. 

Joel continues the assault. Punch after punch reigns down on the other man as blood begins to coat his features. David tries to get a punch or two into Joel’s stomach, but Joel straddles each of his biceps and holds him down so he can continue hitting. The longer Joel hits, the better he feels. This time is different. This time he does not see the features of every man he’s ever hated in the face of his victim. This time he sees only David’s disgusting smirk in his mind’s eye. This time he only thinks about how he is saving Y/N from a lifetime of fear and cruelty. This time Joel will not let his adversary get a strike in first. This time he will be the one to stop the fate of impending devastation that lies in the palms of David’s shaking and broken hands. This time he can save her . 

When Joel is done with his hands, he is panting heavily. He moves on to his feet, kicking the man’s gut sadistically, his trembling hands, his face. Crunch , goes David’s skull. And then he is not moving or breathing.

Joel stops.

A lick of fear trails against the inside of his stomach, but the rage, always the rage warms his stomach like a rush of flames.

So he keeps going. He bends back down and squeezes the man’s throat just to make sure. It’s good he did too because David’s bloodshot, viens-having-burst eyes snap open and David makes a pathetic little squealing noise and Joel squeezes harder, rougher, with more conviction.

In the end, it takes longer than he thought it would. 

Joel only stops when he hears sirens blaring in the distance. He looks up for the first time since the assault started and sees all of the patrons staring at him in revulsion and fear. The bartender actually has the phone in her hand. Joel guesses she was the one to finally call the cops. He guesses he was so sadistic and violent that even this shitty place had seen enough. He thinks to run, briefly, but where would he run to? Everything he has ever wanted in life is now going to be closed off to him. But he saved Y/N and that makes everything worth it. It has to have been worth it.

Joel puts two scarred, calloused fingers to David’s pulse point, as blood (his and David’s) drips down from his knuckle onto the wooden floor and feels nothing.

When the cops handcuff him and take him away, he doesn’t resist. He comes quietly. He cannot ever really be a good man for Y/N, he understands that now, but at least now she and he may know some peace of mind after what he’s done.

***

The time leading up to the trial is a blur. 

Erica pays for an excellent lawyer, but divorces him on the spot. It seems there are some things even she will not forgive, and apparently murder is one of them. She allows the children to see him one last time in cold, sterile police interrogation room. A court-appointed child advocate social worker must be present. They allow him to have his handcuffs taken off for the first time since he was arrested. The kids are told he accidentally killed someone in a bar fight and for legal reasons he leans into the “accidental” part. 

Aiden comes in first. He knew who David was and tells Joel he did the right thing. Joel is surprised. He reaches out a limp hand, dirt caked under his fingernails, and shakes Joel’s for the first time since they’ve known each other and they part ways on good terms.

“You’re not my dad,” Aiden tells him quietly. “But you always put up a good fight to be there.”

And he leaves.

Joel is more touched than he wants to believe.

Y/N’s visit is much more difficult.

“How could you!?” she screams, standing by the door the second she sees him as he sits at the interrogation table, his chair turned toward her. 

At first Joel thinks she means how could he killl another human being. Y/N didn’t seem to know who David was after all. But that’s not what she is mad about.

“How could you leave me!?” she shouts, tears in her eyes. “You’re going to be taken away from me! Mom is leaving you because of this and that means you aren’t like my dad anymore. You’re going to forget all about me and never get to see me again because you killed some dumb man who tried to give me a bible?”

“He was not a good man,” is all Joel can say. 

He can’t be the one to tell her more, hasn’t told anyone how David had threatened her. Not even his lawyer. He doesn’t want to scare her, doesn’t want to admit to anyone he let those words even get to leave that shit stain’s mouth. 

“I don’t care!” she shouts again. “I want you!”

And then she bursts into tears and runs into his chest and Joel holds her against his orange jumpsuit and starts to feel tears trickling down his own cheeks.

“Never gonna forget about you,” he nearly scolds her into hair. “How could you ever think that, baby? You’re my babygirl. I’ll get out one day and come right back to you, understand?”

“But Mom–”

“You’ll be grown by the time I get out and won’t have to worry about what she says. But I’ll tell you this: you might feel different about me by the time your grown up and however you feel I want you to know I’ll respect that. But I ain’t gonna forget about you. Not ever.” 

“Your time is up,” the court-appointed social worker states. 

“No!” Y/N shouts, burying herself deeper into Joel’s embrace. “NO! I’m not leaving! I won’t leave you!”

Joel hugs her back tightly, crying into the top of her head as she sobs softly into his chest. 

In the end, the social worker has to pull her away as she screams.

“I love you, Y/N!” he calls to her as the social worker drags her from him. “Never gonna forget you, babygirl. Remember that.”

All Joel can hear back is a broken wail.

***

Erica attends the trial; the kids are forbidden. Joel’s defense claims it was a drunken accident and goes for manslaughter. Because he killed a known child molester he has no trouble while he waits in jail. He is even considered a hero by some. No one tries to fuck with him and that’s how Joel would prefer it since if he gets into too many fights it will just add to his sentence and he must get out and get back to his babygirl if she’ll still have him. His lawyer tells him not to mention the threats that David made toward Y/N because it will look like more of a reason that Joel would have had to intentionally kill him as opposed to accidentally like the manslaughter plea would have the court believe. Joel listens. He does exactly what he’s told because this lawyer is good and he needs to get out someday for christ sake.

In the end, he gets ten years and his lawyer tells him he could get eight for good behavior.

Eight years, if Joel can manage it.

They take him away to prison in handcuffs. Erica sobs. It is the last time he sees her.

***

Joel always wondered if his temper would land him in prison. Now that he’s here things go surpringly well. He gets a reputation for being the murderer of a child molestor and people respect him, listen to him when he bothers to speak. He keeps things in order and people start to refer to him as the “pod boss.” He also reads a lot in his cell, tries to help people with their cases and appeals if he can. And if someone steps out of line, Joel is more than happy to put them in their place so long as he can avoid attention from the guards, who he actually mostly gets along with to their faces, but behind their backs beats people to a pulp. No one ever dares to snitch on him and he is considered on the right track to get out for good behavior early. 

Time passes — painfully long stretches of time.

He has a lot of time to think, to read. He reads every book in the prison library over the time he is incarcerated. He reads parenting books, self-help books, books on trauma, books on abuse, books on anger management, books on meditation, books on spirituality (nothing sticks in that regard though, he is still furious like God, but less so these days). Somehow his anger has started to simmer down a notch.   

But he worries his babygirl will forget about him, or worse grow to hate him. He’s not sure he’ll survive that.    

Luckily, or he might have withered away and died, somehow Y/N convinces Erica to let her write him a letter once a month and have one call with him on Christmas. 

Christmases quickly become his favorite day of the year. 

Y/N writes him religiously. She talks about how angry she is at him, how she misses him, how she finally fixed the motor on Joel’s old pickup truck, how some boy gave her a love letter on Valentine’s Day, how she thinks of him every day.

Joel never tells her what David said about her, lets her believe he is just some violent, drunken idiot. He writes back how much he misses her, how he read a new book this week, how prison food is shit, how he’d probably greet that boy with a shotgun if he thinks he’s getting anywhere with his babygirl, how his whole heart beats for her.

She’s allowed to send him one photo a year, her most current school photo, and Joel hangs them on the wall of his cell so he can see her beaming at him at his highest and lowest moments along with the tiny picture of Sarah he managed to save from his wallet. 

Aiden even sends him a card each Father’s Day. It never has anything written in it except for whatever stupid pun or text the card came with, but Joel reads between the lines with that one. Each one seems to whisper to him louder and louder, I love you and I forgive you. Joel writes him back, “Thanks, kiddo. -Joel” He hope that conveys the thousands of sorrys he wants to scream from the rooftops and say straight to the boy’s face. He will someday when he gets out. He makes himself promise. He hears from Y/N when Aiden joins the marines. 

When Joel gets to actually hear Y/N’s voice on the old prison phone it’s like the most beautiful sound he has ever heard except for maybe Sarah’s voice. She babbles away about her life and what’s she’s up to and he hangs on every word like gospel. He barely gets a word in, but prefers it that way. Wishes he could hear her singing. Once, when she’s sixteen, and sounds so woefully grown up it hurts Joel’s entire heart, she hums a little absentmindedly and he can’t get the sweet sound out of his head. Her love for him never seems to waver and that is a blessing that Joel will never forget, the only thing he would thank this cruel God for. And of course, his love for her never wavers either. She is the only beacon of light for him in this dark and mundane existence. She is his everything.

***

When Y/N is eighteen and no longer under her mother’s control, she comes to visit him in person. This is the first time they have seen each other in six years. Despite their loving correspondence, Joel is nervous to see her for the first time since her childhood. He worries about how awkward it might be.

When he sees her walking into the dinky little family meeting room, his entire mode of existence changes.

She looks so beautiful, so grown-up. Sure she had always been a cute little kid, Joel always thought that, but now she is a woman. Tears come to Joel’s eyes. When her eyes connect with his, he feels so seen .

He tries to get a word out, but before he can she is running to him, into his arms and Joel has never felt something so perfect in his entire life. He knows he has never felt a love like this before. Not even with Sarah…something about this is different somehow? Joel is not too in touch with his feelings, but he’s trying to be more attentive to them these days with nothing left to do but read about such topics as “emotional regulation” and “mindfulness.” He’ll come back to this thought later though…

Y/N begins to babble into his ear, something about missing him and not wanting it to be awkward, but this is the furthest from awkward Joel has ever felt.

Joel has never been a man of many words so all he can think to say is,

“Missed you, babygirl.”

She grins at that, brighter than all the suns of all the planets in the universe (Joel has been reading about those too) and he laughs for the first time in what feels like a lifetime.

She laughs too, wipes tears from her eyes, and says,

“Missed you too, Joel. More than you know.”

Joel thinks that can’t possibly be true for that is all he has known for the last six years and possibly his entire life: missing her.

She comes once a month, drives an hour just to see him, and she tells him about college and later her very own shitty apartment. Her mother has thrown herself into her work and Aiden is serving his second tour. She makes good grades and has a stable boyfriend that treats her well, she swears. Joel couldn’t be happier for her, except the boyfriend business does make him want to crush that little fucker’s head in for some reason.

***

The last time Y/N comes to visit before his release (eight years to the day for good behavior) (she is 20 damn years old already!) something feels different to Joel. When he hugs her to greet her, he’s suddenly very aware of her body, the curves of it, her softness. Her hair smells so good, he doesn’t want to let go of her and then to his intense dismay and shock he feels himself getting a little excited down south. Immediately, he lets go of her, feeling like a pervert, praying she didn’t and doesn’t notice. He doesn’t see any obvious signs from her and the two sit down (Joel rather quickly) at the flimsy, nailed-down table and they talk of Joel’s impending release. All the while, Joel is trying to stay calm. He convinces himself it was just an accident and that he hadn’t been around any women in what felt like an eternity and that’s what  led him to get worked up. But when Y/N leaves to go home he feels a kind of dull longing in the bottom of his gut. A different kind of longing then what he had felt for a younger Y/N. Joel tells himself not to repress for the first goddamn time in his life and let himself feel. And he does. He feels butterflies and yearning and need, a great big need inside himself. And then he knows what else he feels: the gut-wrenching, unquenchable sensation of love and beneath that, primal, base, and self-loathing: desire . 

In his solo cell (that he has acquired because he is the pod boss and respected) he jerks off to those thoughts, touches himself to those feelings. When he cums unusually hard, he feels an overwhelming amount of shame. Of this, Joel knows, he will never ever tell another soul. Joel also knows he will not hurt his babygirl any more than he already has, intentionally or not, not ever. But then again, being a good, upstanding man has never really quite been in his arsenal, has it?

Tags (LMK if you wanna be tagged!): @toxicanonymity @motelprincess444 @epicrainbowsheep @anama-cara @sheepdogchick3

@denileisariver @lochnymph @mewantpeepaw @fandomdaydreamer @r3dheadedwitch

PLEASE COMMENT LIKE REBLOG IM BEGGING IM PLEADING IM CRYING

PART 2

Violent Heart Masterlist

Full Masterlist of all my work

[thewomancallednova]

Some spoiler-y obervations on today's SNW episode, "Hegemony":

I'm really glad we got to see an adult Gorn that looks more humanoid. When Sam found those anomalous human readings I was really concerned they'd go with a "TOS Gorn a weird Human-Gorn hybrids" thing.

ERICA GOT TO SAY MULTIPLE SENTENCES IM SO HAPPY

I was 100% sure Batel was gonna die when she made a log entry at the start :D Pleasently surprised by how that went

I kinda wish the Gorn weren't such a drawn-out plot with SNW. The feeling I'm getting is that they're just doing "Arena" but with eight episodes scattered over three seasons and I don't really see how that's gonna be better than "Arena". For what it's worth I'd love to get a closer look at how Gorn society in SNW actually works, like how did y'all build those spaceships if you keep cannibalising everyone. And to this episode's credit they did tease in that direction.

Definitely more on board with Scotty by the end of the episode than at the start. I really hope we can keep Carol Kane next season and have her mentor Scotty. I like what SNW has done with Spock, Uhura, Chapel and M'Benga; so I'm optimistic about Scotty, but my first instinct whenever a new major TOS character appears is generally to groan.

How exactly does a demarcation line within a solar system? Like, I'm no physicist, but don't planets usually rotate around stars? Wouldn't that shift planets in and out of Gorn/Federation territory depending on the time of year? Incidentally, there's a Trek novel (by Peter David of course) that explores that exact situation, where a planet is in (IIRC) Tholian territory for two days every year.

Pike's voice when he says "Spock" after seeing the destroyed Caygua is just TT

Seeing Pike interrupt Battel's mission here with a subspace phone call, I wish we'd see that more often the other way around. "Sorry honey, can't talk right now I have to make the pirates revolt against their captain, I'll call you back later okay?"

Love the music cues reminiscent of TOS. And I'm glad in general that the post-Berman Trek shows got to recover from the "sonic wallpaper" directive.

The Starfleet delta pattern on the space suits is really distracting. Like, I know I'm supposed to look at how they're hand-holding but wow, that is a lot of deltas!

It kinda rubs me the wrong way that Spock and Chapel killed the Gorn on the Cuyaga, just when the planetside story gets all about how maybe we can talk with the Gorn. Probably doesn't help that the Gorn took like ten seconds to suffocate and seemed to be in excruciating pain throughout. Like, c'mon Chapel, shoot him already, it's be more merciful.

I think SNW is actually quite clever with connecting its Gorn continuity to that of TOS. The SNW Gorn ships like very different from the TOS ones, which is great because in "Arena" no one recognizes the new ship. The Gorn are only revealed as the perpetrators in conversation with the Metrons, so I think it's feasable that Kirk just doesn't know of them (as long as his relationship with La'an doesn't get any further) and the rest of the crew didn't want to interrupt during the conversation with the seemingly very powerful Metrons. After Kirk is teleported by the Metrons Uhura screams, because 60s show (she should be used to teleportation right, being in Starfleet), but the SNW retcon that she knows of the Gorn and their horrors really gives that moment new depth and makes it less silly.

[steddiebang]

the freaks who could never love anyone (October 10) author:  dima (ao3/bsky/tumblr/twitter) / artist:  robin (tumblr / twitter) Hawkins High School’s show choir group, the Treble Tigers, is in desperate need of new members. Eddie Munson, the group’s de facto student leader, is well aware that they need to do anything they can to be in contention for Nationals.

But Eddie immediately finds himself at odds with one of their latest members, Steve Harrington. A prototypical pompous jock that has no place in a group that’s meant for misfits. But when Steve starts opening up about the many secrets he’s carrying, Eddie realizes that he might need the Treble Tigers to go to Nationals as much as Eddie does.

Tell Me Then Would You Lend A Hand (October 13) Author: funeralbeldam / Artist: rrrrraatt An exploration of Steve’s trauma. How it affects his everyday life, opens him up to Vecna, and sends him on a path of self discovery as the world is ending. His relationships with his friends - most notably one Eddie Munson - and how he views his own self worth. How one man will tear down Steve’s curtain to reveal the truth inside, through the power of music. Who says metalheads and jocks -turning-punks can’t get along?

scheming on a thing (October 14) Author: greatunionic (ao3 / tumblr) / Artist: daysarestranger / singinginmay It’s 1994, and Eddie’s been a guest of Uncle Sam at Pelican Bay since it opened in ‘89, when his public defender stopped defending and he resigned himself to the sixth to life bag the Spring Break of ‘86 had left him holding. Sure, the series of frantic transfers that made Wayne and the party lose track of him (and cost him his unlikely prison penpal, Steve Harrington) truly were a bummer, but life’s actually not too bad, in the long run: he’d got three hots and a cot, ya know, and sometimes a few of the other inmates actually believe him when he tells them he’s innocent. Still — the new lawyer and paralegal shaped suspiciously like one Erica Sinclair is starting to give him pause, and make him wonder if the story’s not quite over yet…

Or: a story about seven letters, the worst love song ever written, and a heist.

Of Space and Time (October 15) Author: @appledagger / Artist: @Ahhrenata / Additional Art: @appledagger, @betwixtandbetweenn In 2073, the world is still moving forward despite arid climates and the quick relay race between man and machine. Within the walls of the hospital center at Vecna Labs, Steve Harrington has just woken up after an accident inside the depths of the classified sections of the lab. Stricken with amnesia, he is brought to Edward Munson’s home to recover and to be observed during his recovery after experimental treatments had brought him back from the brink of death. In Edward’s home, Steve finds question after question. Why does Eddie seem to hate him so much? What do all the observations have to do with his accident? What exactly is going on with his malfunctioning mind, and what does this all have to do with Creel and Vecna’s tech monopoly? All the while, Steve struggles with the feeling that there was something more to his relationship with Eddie that he can’t quite understand.

Road to Nowhere (October 14) Author: @sharpbutsoft / Artist: @patternscolorsflowers Eddie Munson isn’t dead, and he’s trying not to make it everyone’s problem. After the horrorshow that was Spring Break, he’s been keeping to himself, attending his “legally you cannot call this a bribe but, yes, obviously it’s a bribe” physical therapy sessions, and trying to recover from his brief but violent death. Enter Steve Harrington, and his compulsive need to be useful, who’s volunteered to taxi him to and from these sessions (with minimal bitching.) This newfound friendship isn’t without its challenges though. Steve, not the best with his words, struggles to define his feelings for Eddie, who has it in his head that the only reason they’re not together yet, is because he’s not better yet. When an argument threatens to snuff out the sparks flying between them, Eddie has to learn that better is a journey, not a destination, and one he doesn’t have to take alone…

The Ones Who Know (October 15) Author: @tacticat / @hereforthesteddie / Artist: @miloboiwonder / @milotheboywonder / Artist: @donttellunclesam “Robs, Eddie’s mad at me. I did something wrong, I think. I don’t really know.“ 

"Can you tell me what happened?" 

"We were watching movies last night and we-” his throat closes up on him and he struggles to take in a deep breath. “We kissed." 

"What!?” The unlucky customers waiting on them can probably hear her, she reacts so loudly.

“I know! I wasn’t expecting it." 

 A look of confusion crosses her face.

"Wait but Steve, you’re-”

“Straight? I know!”

Does he, though? She gives him a curious look that seems to ask the same question. 

Steve didn’t used to like being someone who knows, when that meant keeping secrets about horrifying and heartbreaking things. But now that he’s learning beautiful and precious secrets about the people who are important to him, he’s starting to learn that being one of the ones who know doesn’t have to be so bad.

change your mind (October 16) Author: helix_stomper / Artist: horsegirleddiemunson  After his breakup with Nancy, Steve Harrington keeps it a secret that he hasn’t made an effort to meet his soulmate. When he accidentally wakes up next to them a few days after his 18th birthday, he’s surprised to find that it’s not only another guy, but somebody else in Hawkins. Between losing all his old friends, learning how not to be an asshole, and balancing his newfound sexuality in a closed-minded town, Steve has his work cut out for him. Eddie Munson doesn’t believe in soulmates, but that doesn’t stop him from waiting in the dreamscape every night for his. Balancing life as an openly queer, drug-dealing super senior in Hawkins, Indiana is no cakewalk, especially with Billy Hargrove on his ass. But maybe, just maybe, there’s something to that whole soulmate thing after all.

Drowning In Your Love (October 20) Author: @steveshairychest / steveshairychest /Artist: parasite_z (twitter) / @parasite-z

There’s something so enticing about forbidden love, about yearning for someone that you know you can’t have. Eddie knows he’s breaking every oath he took on the day of his knighting, but he can’t help but be drawn to the golden prince that beckons him with a sharp tooth smile. It’s forbidden to speak with the merfolk that occupy the ocean around the city but Eddie has never been very good at following the rules, especially when he’s got his hands tangled in a beautiful merman’s soft hair. Each day, he finds himself with his toes in the sand and with his heart in the hands of Steve Harrington, the heir to the merkingdom. They meet in secret at the rockpools, and the more Eddie learns about the prince, the harder it becomes to keep away. His knights oath to never take a lover gnaws at the back of his mind the first time he presses a kiss to Steve’s lips. Things become difficult when the Queen of the merkingdom starts to pressure Steve to take the necessary steps required of him to become King, the first being to choose a bride. But Steve doesn’t want any of the maidens that his mother forces him to meet. He wants the knight in clunky armor that brings him treasures from the human world, the knight that he shared his first kiss with under the light of the moon. Forbidden love is never easy. It hurts and bares its teeth just when you thought things were going well. Will Steve and Eddie be able to make it through unscathed?

Nobody’s Baby (October 22) Author: ArtaxLivs / Artist: LexPlexDraws It’s Dirty Dancing but Steddie Style. Steve is a privileged young college graduate who is supposed to spend one last summer with the family at an upscale resort but stumbles in unexpected friendships with some of the resort’s employees. Eddie is the dance instructor with a chip on his shoulder. An impossible situation makes them unwilling dance partners but maybe the possibility of trust will make them more than that.

it’s a lonely world when everyone knows your name (October 23) Author: @whataboutthefish / Artist: @hawkinsleather and on Twitter Steve Harrington had a nemesis, Eddie ‘The Face’ Munson. The only thing was, Eddie didn’t know. Eddie Munson was the face of the decade and fashion’s darling, but his hard partying ways and lack of professionalism- in Steve’s opinion- had him seething. When Steve was paired with Eddie for a photo shoot he was already anticipating hating the whole ordeal. What he didn’t expect was Eddie being more than just his persona.

Or

Hottest Alpha Model Steve ‘The Hair’ Harrington just might be wrong about Omega Supermodel Eddie ‘The Face’ Munson.

My Dad, Your Papa, Our Father (October 25) Author: @strangerthingssteddiebrainrot / Artist: @waldos-art Steve thought a memorial for the fallen if Hawkins lab was pretentious and insincere. He wasn’t the only one. But if he hadn’t come, he probably wouldn’t have found out about, this. So really, it could be argued, understood even, that he was completely taken off guard when a picture of one of the deceased scientists was placed on the memorial table and he couldn’t control what came out of his mouth, loud enough that there was no way everybody didn’t hear it. “Dad!?”

A Haunted House With A Picket Fence (October 25) author: Quinn (ao3/tumblr/twitter) / artist: AtlasMoth666 (twitter) Eddie Munson is no stranger to bad choices. It’s how he ended up a single father selling drugs to keep him and his kid clothed and fed. Dumb choices have him fleeing Chicago in the middle of the night and renting a place in his shitty hometown in Indiana while he plans his next move.

It’s also how he ends up asking his stupidly hot neighbor to babysit his daughter while he goes on a last-minute job interview, and much to his surprise, stupid-hot neighbor agrees. And it turns out he’s not just handsome, but funny, a great cook, he loves Eddie’s weirdo kid, and may just be the love of Eddie’s life.

If only starting over and escaping his past was that easy.

after all this time (i’m still into you) (October 26) Author: oriscribes  / Artist: unspcfiedfigure / Artist: @hellfireloserclub Steve just wanted to keep working on his TV show, but due to some clauses buried in his contract he’d been coerced into a fake dating scheme. Which was especially stupid because Munson didn’t even like him. Steve should know, Munson had already rejected him years ago. Eddie just wanted to keep his head down until his contract ran out so he could get back to writing with Corroded Coffin instead of doing this idol shit. He wasn’t counting on getting outed and having to do damage control… by pretending to date someone who he maybe sorta had (has?) a huge crush on. OR: Steve pretends that if he keeps calling Eddie by his last name then he won’t develop any feelings to go with that crush he’d been trying to forget about. Meanwhile, Eddie is trying to figure out what went wrong years ago and if this time could be different. 

how greedy my heart (October 27) Author: @matchingbatbites / Artist: @amethyst-crowns After his first encounter with the Upside Down, Steve needs something to help him relax. He gets more than he expects from drug dealer Eddie Munson, who pulls him into a world of gentle care, good feelings, and calm that he’s never experienced before.

All Eyes on Me in the Center of the Ring (October 28) Author: a_lil_a_lot  - twitter / tiktok / bsky / tumblr / Artist:  bienmoreau - twitter Ex-Olympic gymnast, Steve Harrington, is politely asked to not return to college after the summer - upon his return to his hometown, he’s not expecting a trip to the circus with his best friend to have such an impact on him. Just when he thinks he’s run out of options, he takes a chance in following the Munson Family Circus and finds not only something he enjoys, but a place where he belongs.

(he’s) a runaway foal that doesn’t know where to go (October 31) Author: @patti_cake08 (twitter)/ @moltenchocolatelavacake  Steve Harrington has always loved too much, he knows this. And yet he’s never been enough for anybody. It’s why relationships never work out for him. But he tried again because of course he did. Always too stupid for his own good, his feelings were bullshit. A week after having his heart broken by a man he believed he’d meant more to than flirty phone calls and occasional fucks, Steve ends up at Forest Hills Trailer Park. He’d gone looking for a reprieve, a comfort, a way out of his grief. Instead he finds a pair of pale arms and a yearning heart eager to help him heal and, maybe, show him his love is enough.

[mbavholidayexchange]

Having trouble thinking of prompts for the MBAV Holiday Exchange?

Don't worry! We got you! Here's some fun ideas to consider:

Winter themed prompts:

Your favorite ship cooking/baking for the holiday season!

the Fang Gang hold a holiday exchange of their own and have to think of gifts to give each other!

Character themed holiday playlists! (ex: What music would Sarah get into the holiday spirit with?)

Getting snowed in/spending the holiday stuck in one place!

A moodboard of your favorite character wearing a particular color/type of warm clothing that they love (ex: Rory with red gloves!)

Canon specific prompts:

A fic where your favorite one off villain comes back for one more storyline!

Or a fic with a different supernatural creature you wished was in an episode! (ex: what if fairies were in MBAV?)

What happened after a certain episode ended? What were the characters doing in the aftermath?

A rare pairing that was explored breifly in an episode to be expanded upon! (ex: Ethan and Erica have to team up together!)

Good old fashion character/episode playlists!

Always remember to include your list of things you do not want to recieve (like things you would be uncomfortable with) so that your secret santa will know exactly what you want!

Also, each gift will be made by a different person! So if there's some overlap in a prompt submissions, whoever creates from your inspiration will put their own flare on it! So don't be afraid of "copying" someone elses prompt or being "predictable", there's plenty of room here for so much creativity! Happy creating!

[siren-darkocean]

I've been imagining Lewa and Takanuva/Takua as the princess and the pauper ever since I saw your post. Who would be the princess and who would be the pauper? What roles would everyone else be?

OH hey nice thing to see when I finally wake up (watching the meteor shower with the fan two nights in a row screwed my sleep schedule up)

I feel like they would both fit both spots while also adding to funny bits of their personality

Lewa being the princess would be fitting because of the whole thing of technical Demi Gods the Toa Mata/Nuva are, and the whole deal of their training before the pods (someone had an au idea of their training being even longer than in canon)

But Takua/Takanuva would be even funny as well because of his wondering tendencies and urges to explore, while him being the prophesied Herald of Light

Now of the pauper;

While they both cannot sit still long enough for Erica's tasks (aka when Madam Carp wants dresses made) to get done that does add more stress on them like Erica has

Lewa definitely fits of wanting to leave for music (you cannot convince me if he wasn't a Toa he would gladly join the Le-Koro Band) while Takua/Takanuva with his call of destiny or with wanting to chronicle stories around the world

Wow all this came out when I JUST woke up lol

Long story short they fit both sides on this perfectly, but if I have to choose Lewa would be the Princess whole Takua/Takanuva would be the Pauper

As for the others-

Onua would definitely be Julian in this sense of Lewa is the princess (their besties in canon and I love their dynamic both platonic and romantic)

For King Dominic would probably put either Gali or Jaller (this could lead to platonic or romantic depending on your preference, I'm more leaning to a platonic ig plus the two fit King Dominic really well)

Madame Carp for me would probably be Dume in some weird way (You can convince me that doesn't fit him)

Queen Genevieve would be one of the Turaga probably Matau if once again Lewa is the princess (Mata would be fitting I suppose but like, I wanna keep Mata Nui and Teridax in bg of gods)

Preminger would SOOOOO be Akimou, I know it would be funny with Teridax and how he's a main antagonist but having it be Akimou would be absolutely hilarious to me and fits of keeping Mata Nui and Teridax in the bg of gods

Then the cats, Serafina and Wolfie

Serafina would be the Uxar aka Creature of Jungle from Gen 2 Bionicle (I love throwing the Elemental Creatures into G1 Bionicle au's because their my favorite of G2 Bionicle) or an Ash Bear

Wolfie would SOOOOOOOO be Pewku in this

Preminger's poodle Midas (seriously that's his name? I never knew that, I gotta rewatch the movie then lol because what do you mean Kathleen Barr voices Bertie?!) I'm not sure of this but maybe the Kaja-Nui (as in the one in the Mata Nui Online game you enter its nest finding all the infected Comets Akimou sells and infects Po-Koro with, man HAD to have some control over that thing if he wanted to grab more of those comets)

That's all I can think of so far (had to edit because my sleep induced brain forgot the rest sorry)

[meddow]

I’ve been catching up on Star Trek Discovery and it’s kind of interesting the difference in stakes between Disco and SNW. Disco has this focus on season long plot arcs in which what is at stake is avoiding some cataclysm which would destroy whole planets or threaten the entire Federation and somehow only Discovery can save everyone. That has it’s plus points. While the seasons start slow I’m usually end up binging the last few episodes, and also gets time explore the concept at the heart of the season more than a one episode or two-parter ever could. I loved that a whole chunk of episodes was devoted to figuring out how to first contact a species which was nothing like the Federation had ever encountered before.

But, it does feel like slightly wearisome that somehow it's always Discovery saving the galaxy. And the show really struggles with smaller, character driven stakes. And too often it just falls back on killing off a character to given another character angst, which is a mistake in the first place, and then only for then the series to not even commit to killing that character off and they’re back – sometimes within the same episode.

Whereas Strange New Worlds keeps the stakes considerably lower. The only episode I can think of in which the entire galaxy is threatened is (hilariously) the musical episode. Sometimes the whole ship is in danger (Ghosts of Illyria, Momento Mori and Among the Lotus Eaters come to mind) and sometimes the threat is the Federation being dragged into war (Hegemony, Quality of Mercy – but given that’s a essentially a dream sequence, it doesn’t really count). SNW does do a lot of character stakes. Ad Astra per Aspera obviously is the example of the show doing this extremely well – where the stakes is Una going to prison.

But then SNW suffers from being a prequel and the subsequence plot armor that characters have as a result. Sometimes that’s fine. Pike knowing his fate and having to deal with that was an interesting plotline in season 1. Knowing Chapel/Spock is doomed gives the relationship a bit of kick it wouldn’t necessarily have given romantic relationships is not one of the show’s strengths. But for example in Hegemony, everyone worrying Chapel was dead felt like a massive waste of time – we know she’s not because she’ll still be on the Enterprise when Kirk takes over. Same with Spock, Uhura and M’Benga.

Really of the main cast the only characters who currently have stakes are Una, La’an and Erica cos we don’t know their future. If Erica gets fed up with only ever being the pilot and decides to get a transfer, we can believe that she may just. If La’an is badly injured fighting the Gorn we can believe she may die. If Starfleet decide to offer Una a promotion and her own ship, we can believe she would accept it. Yet those characters are largely underserved (Erica particularly, Una and La’an have their moments, but it never feels like enough).

Anyway, this is all a bit of a ramble but really the true winner is Lower Decks, which sometimes does have Federation threat level stakes but more often keeps the stakes nice and low, doesn’t rely on killing off characters for drama but when it does and brings them back a few episodes later manages to make a joke out of it, and none of the characters have plot armor except that it’s a cartoon and of course it will most likely return to the status quo the next episode.

[crimsonwing62]

Stranger Things HC (Based around the Christmas holiday but not really a Christmas HC)

Its the late 2010s? Everyone's grown up, they have their own families, their careers, their own lives.

Steve's a support worker at the local all through years school.

Robin currently teaches a humanities subject at the local university. 

Nancy worked as a journalist eventually building her own paper from the ground up and just celebrated its 10 Yr anniversary. She and Robin have travelled the world and still plan on new adventures.

Eddie's was discovered in '88 he toured throughout the 90s and early '00s. He still makes music but likes to focus more on Music Producing so he can spend more time at home with Steve and the kids (15f, 10f, 6m). Robin and Nancy are their Godparents

The four get together for an adults only dinner at least once a week, alternating who's hosting - everyone secretly prefers Steve's cooking but no-one ever says it. Robin often pops in to the Harrington-Munson household for a cup of tea and a gossip throughout the week anyway.

Dustin works at NASA (or an equally impressive physics institute), in Florida which they all simultaneously give him shit for and are jealous of bc he can go to Disney and Orlando whenever he wants to. 

Lucas and Max have been married for 7 years now. Max still skates, Lucas still plays basketball with his friends on Saturdays. They have a two kids (12f, and 4m). 

Erica is also a world renowned scientist in her field. She often gets brought on to teams as a consultant and has worked with Dustin on a couple projects.

Will has his own Gallery in California which Jane (El) sometimes volunteers at. Mike works across the road at a job he loves but not as much as his Husband, Will.

Jane's taking life easy taking in experiences, learning what she can about the world. Max and Jane often meet up for girlie days.

Jonathan tours new exhibitions, releases photobooks, does photography around the world. He travels with his partner (or roommate depending on which country) Argyle. His most recent photobook has been his biggest success. It featured a collection of his earliest work of the Upside Down Gang. Themes of Queer Platonic Family and Queer Joy could be explored through the photos and the accompanying pieces written by Nancy.

Hopper and Joyce retired together and finally married in the 90s. Hopper gets antsy so he still does some volunteer work here and there.

Karen finally left Ted Fucking Wheeler after his reaction to the revelation of the the '86 earthquake actually was, was less than appropriate (he under reacted, which made her realise how much of an ahole he was) she remarried to a lovely chap called, Dan, a few years later. The Wheeler kids warmed up to him eventually. And Holly Wheeler exists somewhere but doesn't really apply here.

Anyway every year they made a promise to go away for Christmas.

Robin usually researches the place to go, Steve co-ordinates the kids, hopper-byers', and Karen and her Husband's Schedule to find the best dates to book it for, and everyone's order of arrival. Nancy organises the travel for the four and Steddie's kids whilst everyone else organises their own. (Will books Jim and Joyce's flights for them. Joyce is okay with a computer, much better than Jim, but if it goes wrong she can't fix it) Eddie wrangles their kids, packs and gets their family ready to go as Steve is often to focused on the craziness of  school the run up to winter break.

Steve, Eddie, their kids, Robin and Nancy are the first to arrive, two days after their schools finishes. Eddie and Nancy are usually sent into the village to get a Christmas tree whilst Steve and Robin unpack the food, the drinks, snacks, the decorations. The kids, after exploring and claiming beds, get involved in the decorating part, often making paper rings, snowflakes. The eldest acts like she hates it but secretly loves making them better than last year.

When Eddie and Nancy get back, most of the decorations are up except for the Tree. They do that together, Christmas music blasting in the background.

The Jim, Joyce, Will, Mike, Karen, Dan, arrive mid morning the next day having met up  after the airport and drove up together.

Lucas, Max, their two kids and Jane, Jonathan and Argyle arrive at the same time mid afternoon.

Dustin's the last one to arrive late evening that day.

The whole time is full of fun, buzzing energy, exchanging stories from the year and generally enjoy being in each others presences after being away for so long. A family walk outside on Christmas Eve. One day, They play in the snow and end up in a massive snowball fight. Inevitably there's at least one evening, when the kids have gone to bed, and a couple bottles of alcohol have been consumed so the everyone's a little tipsy and honest, the topic of that place comes up. Most of them have dealt with the trauma it caused, gone to therapy (either paying for it themselves or via Eddie, Jonathon, or Nancy covering the cost). Night terrors were few and far between, paranoia about flickering lights or animal screeching noises have turned into a dulled response. The initial flinch will always be there but panic and worry that used to follow doesn't anymore. This particular year, it hits the party that Lucas and Max's eldest is the same age as the younger party members were when Will went missing, and Jane turned up on Mike's door step. And Steve and Eddie's eldest is a year younger than the elder party members were, and their middle daughter the same age as Erica when she was brought into the fold. Lucas, Max, Steve and Eddie make a mental note to keep a closer eye and hug them a little tighter this year.

----

Jonathan's photography book is based on one of my favourite head canons by @schrijveer

I

This headcanon was inspired by a house i saw in an interior design book and thought it looked like a perfect place for the Party's Christmas get together…

I'm also 60% sure my brain was also consulting the Music video for Last Christmas for ideas of activities...

[pikefied]

Thank you for responding to previous polls. You can also add more themes you would like to see explored in the comments. 😉

[mymindstv]

Steddie - Corroded Coffin or Hellfire stuff ideas

I get the usual shit of “You’re dating who?!” when the guys hear about Eddie with Steve, but I think there’s more ideas that can be explored

- instead of trying to stop Eddie from dating the former king of jocks or test him to see if he’s worthy, the three stooges take it upon themselves to get them together (que some half-baked brainstorming to create romantic openings which shows none of them a have romantic bone in their bodies combined, which either Eddie or Steve won’t notice, or just cause a chaotic mess)

listen, they’re weirdos, they’ve accepted that since they knew, but man does Eddie take the cake in being an oddity, they gotta give this man the best chance possible to look good, but after spying a date or two, it looks like they don’t need to help, Steve’s pretty into Eddie’s weird and is also off-putting himself

- rockstar drama, in some stories Eddie’s in a new band (even read a cute one shot with Erica & Argyle playing in the band), kicked out of his old band, or no longer in music because the guys fuck off after the whole “wanted for murder” witchunt (whether because they’re forced to stop interacting by family or they choose to stop hanging out with him(self-preservation, questioning how well they know their friend, seeing him on friendly terms with a former jock, etc))

maybe Corroded Coffins ends in an ugly argument, Eddie pissed at the people he used to be there for all the time leaving him in the dust (already lost the old trailer, maybe the guitar gets wrecked, his body and mind forever scarred, just so much has already been lost or taken), maybe the guys feel like they don’t know their friend anymore for a multitude of reasons (like Eddie refusing to talk about anything but unable to act like nothing’s happened), or silent stalemate where no one knows what to say, they just feel something’s changed and it’s not for the better so they drift apart

maybe sometime goes by people move to bigger cities, the guys are still in the music scene trying a name for themselves, something something find a cool place to play live advertising on diy flyers outside and surprise Eddies playing tonight (something something see him play, see who he’s playing with, and why is Steve Harrington here? maybe he’s on stage too), time to reconnect?

- also I get it, Steve plays nice with the hellfire guys because he’s turning a new a leaf, but he will remind motherfuckers how he earned the title of king among a bunch of knuckledragging jocks if they want to issues, Eddie’s not gotta stop it that’s what makes him hot under the collar (idk who needs to hear this but nice doesn’t equal doormat, that’s trend’s boring)

I guess this is more on the friendship side compared to romance, but in all my worlds, steddie still happens, it’s just not the main focus bc Im bad at that anyway

[ericas-music-exploration]

All about Jazz!! 

This Tuesday I took a trip to downtown New Brunswick to the Tavern on George to listen to a fine musical group. Every Tuesday and Thursday you can go to experience a live jazz show by the New Brunswick jazz project. You can even go Friday and Saturday for live acoustics. 

The experience I had listening to this jazz group was a bit much for me. I am not typically a jazz person and listening to very loud jazz while eating was a lot, but the music itself was decent. 

 When I think about music and eating I think about lower music so I can still hear the person next to me but here I couldn’t even hear myself think. But besides it being a restaurant the experience of hearing all the different sounds the instruments made. Along with how much emotion was displayed by the musicians was interesting . My favorite part of the live show was seeing how involved and expressive the musicians were while playing and that’s something I believe one could only feel live.

The trumpet and trombone were my favorites because they really set the frame of the whole thing along with the saxophone. The drums seemed to hold everything together while the guitar set a nice touch. The piano seemed to be more of a filler and the whole thing is very well put together. As someone who has never experienced a jazz show it was nice to experience but I think it would have to be one and done for me. I do give a lot of respect to the musicians because in every song they shine light on each instrument a little bit and they did a good job of putting their emotion into it.  They really connected with the crowd. 

The Tavern itself was very cool. I made a reservation and they had a cool little reserved piece on the table. I went with my boyfriend and we got “The Great Moz” which was a giant mozzarella stick that was  “the size of the NJ turnpike”. It was delicious. The service seemed nice, you could not get much conversation due to the noise. I felt a bit rude just being on my phone the whole time, even my boyfriend joked and said “so are you really going to be on your phone and not enjoy the music”. I was only using my phone to take notes. The crowd seemed to be all jazz lovers and it was cool seeing how many people enjoyed the performance. 

I will give my respect to the musicians because if I were someone who really enjoys jazz I would have appreciated it more. Although I walked out with a bit of a headache due to the loudness, it was a nice experience and maybe I would give jazz another chance. I’m also very curious about what acoustic music they play on Friday and Saturday. Maybe I will go back to give them a chance. 

[ginger-grimm]

INTRODUCING: CONNIE CUNNINGHAM

Full Name: Cornelia Ruth Cunningham

Birthdate: March 13th, 1968

Hair Color: Blonde

Eye Color: Blue

Species: Human

Family: Carter Cunningham (Father), Cynthia Cunningham (Mother), Chrissy Cunningham (Older Twin Sister, deceased), Curtis Cunningham (Younger Brother)

Love Interest: Eddie Munson

Friends: Caspar Seyed, Steve Harrington, Robin Buckley, Nancy Wheeler, Dustin Henderson, Max Mayfield, Lucas Sinclair, Erica Sinclair

Likes: Music, running track, spending time with Caspar, reading, all things pink, Curtis & Chrissy, cherries, classic movies

Dislikes: Jason Carver, her mom, sneaking around, keeping secrets, being tied down (metaphorically), not being clued-in on something, violence of any kind, apple sauce (there was a traumatizing incident with it in her middle school days)

Phobias: Spiders, losing control

Style: Lots of jeans and blouses or cutesy shirts, doesn’t like any kind of heeled shoe and will usually wear sneakers or ballet flats, her hair is usually worn open and is only up when she’s working hard, minimal jewlery (she only wears a necklace with angel wings, which she got from Eddie as a gag gift, but she ended up loving it just to spite him), likes nail polish

Speech: American accent - no specific region, normal cadence of voice, rarely ever gets loud, usually soft-spoken, gets that chastizing mom voice when she’s pissed off

Physical Quirks/Scars: Has a scar above her right brow from when Curtis chucked a toy truck at her head when they were little

Personality: Caring, diligent, hard worker, observant, romantic, bit of a control freak, approachable, optimistic, rebellious

Background: Born and raised in Hawkins, Indiana, Connie Cunningham has always dreamt of leaving her tiny little hometown to explore the world and soak up every opportunity she could - if only it weren’t for her controlling mother, watching everything her daughters do, what goes on their body, what they eat, who they associate with. Connie hasn’t had it easy, though you wouldn’t know it purely by looking at her. Because her sister Chrissy is so beloved by everyone, people assume the same applies to Connie. But the truth is, the younger twin can’t catch anyone’s attention, not matter how hard she tries. It isn’t until her Freshman year of High School that she makes an actual friend in fellow loner Caspar Seyed. After three years of diligently working at Ray’s Records, running track for Hawkins High, and plotting her escape after graduation, Connie is sick and tired of always being her obedient little self. She wants to break out of her shell, and she gets that opportunity when she begins tutoring Eddie Munson, leading to an exciting, yet frightening couple of months, consisting of the two of them sneaking around together. But Connie has other secrets, from the people she cherishes most. When her sister is killed and Eddie becomes prime suspect, Connie refuses to believe this. When it turns out she may go the way of Chrissy, she has to team up with people she never thought would look her way in High School, along with their tiny little accomplices.

Faceclaim: Annalisa Cochrane

TAGGING: @waterloou @firsthorror @eddysocs @ocs-supporting-ocs @foxesandmagic @veetlegeuse @decennia @hiddenqveendom @arrthurpendragon @luucypevensie @richitozier @noratilney @oneirataxia-girl @wordspin-shares @nejires-hado @endless-oc-creations​ @lucys-chen    

[airyairyaucontraire]

In my mind where a lot of things are more to my liking, Stranger Things is a TV show in the "old" style, that is with seasons of 20+ episodes coming out once a week so that a) the audience doesn't feel pressure to "binge" which just isn't conducive to real enjoyment, and b) the plot has room to breathe, events can develop more gradually, more relationships and conflicts and combinations of characters can be explored, and in between the episodes where Big Plot happens and Shit Gets Real there is more space for lighter material and lower-stakes problems to solve. (You can call this filler if you like but I think it's important.) (And if someone gets injured they can be shown recovering over subsequent episodes and experiencing, you know, pain or discomfort and difficulty doing their normal activities rather than carrying on as if they're still in good condition, or they healed almost instantly like Wolverine or something, because the accelerating plot demands it. I have a thing about that.)

ANYWAY!

Stuff that would be in Better Stranger Things:

There is a local public access TV facility that almost no one is using. Dustin finds out about it. Dustin's eyes light up with the fire of a boy who is going to get all his friends in on this. You can base most of a season on this honestly, featuring:

That's Just My Opinion, a talk show hosted by Robin Buckley and featuring either Max Mayfield or Erica Sinclair as guest in which they discuss and comprehensively criticise a topic suggested by the "live studio audience" (whoever else is hanging around). The levels of smart and disgruntled adolescent girl scorn could punch another hole through into a different dimension.

Attempted music videos from Corroded Coffin with friends roped in as actors (Steve gets targeted for a lot of this).

Investigative news reports from Nancy which range from warning about a door-to-door scammer targeting the elderly to the time she interviewed actual Mothman.

Just basically livestreaming their Dungeons & Dragons sessions. The whole Party is in on this, they take turns to DM, and Will in particular goes all out.

Max does a little skateboard trick.

Steve does movie reviews. Almost exclusively of movies he found confusing and/or annoying.

Dustin's science show with special guest Mr Clarke.

We Lent the Video Camera to Eddie Munson and This Is What Happened, a weekly show whose content can never really be predicted, but damned if Eddie isn't creative and inventive. Usually features at least one very bumpy shot of his legs running followed by a breathless explanation with the camera too close to his face.

Look What I Can Do, a spin-off from Max's little skateboard trick bit where basically anyone demonstrates a trick they can do. Features Steve twirling things, Dustin doing weird bendy things with his arms, Lucas's musical farts, Mike's attempted bike jumps, Eddie turning his eyelids inside out because you know he was that kid, El levitating Steve's car, and Mike again burping the alphabet. The disparity in the trickiness level of these tricks is not commented upon.

[thesinglesjukebox]

NEWJEANS - SUPER SHY

[7.60]

We're a bit excited to be back, if you couldn't tell...

Crystal Leww: NewJeans is a culmination of Min Hee Jin's career-long exploration of the many versions of girlhood and what it means. "Super Shy" is girlhood in 2023, which is to say, it's mostly just vibes -- uwu charm lyrics, wispy singing, and a dance made for Tiktok dancing with your homies. It is one of my least favorite NewJeans songs because it's so non-specific and made for viral meme repeatability than the embarrassingly sincere, sometimes wistful, heart-swooping songs about crushes that I love more from NewJeans but still, non-specific NewJeans still goes off in the club and that's good enough for me.  [7]

Jacob Sujin Kuppermann: Every NewJeans song (except for the League of Legends one) is an expertly constructed rush of joy, but "Super Shy" is perhaps the most complete demonstration of why their formula works. The production and songwriting -- here handled by Frankie Scoca and Erica De Casier, two key figures in the "dancing alone in your room" space -- are great, obviously. But they're great in a very precise, measured way -- every aspect of "Super Shy" plays to the particular strengths of its performers. The skittering drums and dreamy synths come in and out of focus but the vocals are always given center stage, the simplicity of the melody and the unfussiness of the vocal performances making the crush pop lyrics seem at once artificial and deeply real. The appeal of NewJeans -- for me at least -- is in that strange crux: the fun that they're having is found exactly in the effort they're putting in. [9]

Anna Katrina Lockwood: Probably the slightest of NewJeans' singles thus far, "Super Shy" is nonetheless a delight. A fizzing little bundle of feelings, this may also be the most distinctively teenage song in NewJeans' catalog, which is appropriate -- they are indeed still teenagers, a truth I feel is still relevant to acknowledge. The push-and-pull of the drum'n'bass underpinnings balance a batch of diaphanous vocals, even more subtle than the vocal performances customary for NewJeans to date. The melodies are simple and relatively consistent, in contrast to the beat, which never settles -- it skitters, then thuds, bounces, disappears, phases back in, pulses -- always in motion. This is a very brief song, aside from just being a minimalist composition, and its pace goes some way to disguising its length, but not all the way. Given the teenage crush subject matter of "Super Shy", not to mention NewJeans' oeuvre as a whole, it feels almost poetically unsatisfying -- much like the vast majority of my teenage crushes, there's a lot of excitement without a complete payoff. Still, a very charming song.  [7]

Michael Hong: NewJeans watch their crush from afar. And yet it feels close. The group might have positioned themselves at the forefront of K-pop's current infatuation with club beats, but it's the low-key nature of their music, the minimalistic simplicity, that's so captivating. They're easy: "find a lil' spot, just sit and talk," the idea enough to render them giddy. "I'm all nervous cause you're on my mind all the time," they hum in a low buzz on the chorus, close to the rapid flutter of the drum 'n' bass production -- something so thrilling about divulging a crush that it makes you wish you had the courage to voice it to the object of your affection. [8]

Leah Isobel: On "Super Shy," NewJeans approach courtship as if it's a game of hopscotch. There's no fear of failure as there might be on songwriter Erika de Casier's version of this concept. Instead there's just bouncy, breezy momentum, sourced from their confidence and collective joy. As the girls trade off lines it becomes less about the one-to-one specificity of an individual relationship and more about the sweetness of connection itself, how the dances and rituals and games are evidence of the vast history and scope of human love, how each relationship is really the individual, internal universe reminding us of its congruity with the universe outside. We are all both the lover and the loved, all special, all super shy. [9]

Nortey Dowuona: Erika De Casier gave this team a very well crafted pop record that could never get the push or interest that it could done by a girl group of five. They're all good singers, but mostly indistinguishable from each other, blurring into a bright lilt that just fades behind the club kicks and only sparks to life on the line, "you don't even know my name, do ya?" It's the only stand out lyric, a deeply felt one at least due to the emphasis put on it, and the low bass synths just pops up and down, leaving the drums to move the song forward. They can only get so far, even chopping the vocals behind the only distinct lyric but leaving off with very little impression that the only one to have is that Erika de Casier gave this team a very well crafted pop record that could... [5]

Oliver Maier: The deft, reserved feel of NewJeans' second EP has been largely - probably correctly - attributed to Erika de Casier, who maybe relished the opportunity to condense her introverted RnB into sugary pop morsels. "Super Shy" has emerged as the consensus favourite and it's not hard to see why, between its zeitgesty DnB beat and nuclear earworm hook. It's not perfect: the verses are a bit incidental and it's just too short. But the way each member's voice cartwheels over another's with every successive chorus loop is magic. [9]

Wayne Weizhen Zhang: This is all about the bubbling, butterflies-in-your-stomach space between "I'm super shy" and "Wait a minute while I make you mine." NewJeans punctuates it with the energy of five Powerpuff Girls on a mission to make their crush notice them. Super shy as in very shy, yes--but more so super shy, as in superheroes of shyness.  [9]

Andrew Karpan: Cool and iconically bouncy, it's a song about the ethereal placelessness of a crush, articulating a kind of online-era yearning that places the NewJeans crew in the present as much as any other literally bubbling club-lite touch. [9]

Kat Stevens: Hits the same buttons (Sweetness and Slaps) as T2's "Heartbroken".  [8]

Ian Mathers: I don't know what it says, about current trends in pop or about the amount of attention I've been paying, that this is a lot closer to the first PinkPantheress album than I would have guessed. Crossing my fingers that I'm not pulling a guy who has only seen Boss Baby about this. [7]

Alex Ostroff: If you had said even yesterday that I would be rating "Boy's a Liar Pt. 2" higher than "Super Shy" [spoilers!] I would have told you that you were crazy. But, weirdly, PinkPantheress' chorus has the ebullient bubbling fizzy burst of joy in the vocals that a song about a brand-new crush demands. "Super Shy" is an earworm, and the melody is everything I could possibly want, but NewJeans' delivery remains at the same level of enthusiasm throughout. I've had it on loop for the past 15 minutes and I could absolutely listen to it forever but every time we come back around to the chorus, I can't help but want the song to EXPLODE into emotions that match the subject. The closest it ever gets is circa "You don't even know my name, do you?" -- the group taking pleasure not in the feeling itself but in the safety of anonymity, the simple pleasure of a crush that makes you feel warm and makes you smile for a passing moment but which you know will never go anywhere, because you won't even say hi to them. Maybe that was inevitable for a song about being Super Shy, but I want them (and the song) to make that leap. [7]

Rachel Saywitz: I learned the entirety of the "Super Shy" dance a few months ago at an NYC studio I've been frequenting for the past year and a half. For weeks, I practiced waacking on the 7 train and went over complex step sequences in my apartment hallway in the dead of night. I'm not a great dancer, and K-pop choreography is often too advanced for my wobbly body to handle. But I saw something I could maybe replicate with "Super Shy": in the intricate poise of NewJeans' movements, the communal joy of their performances, that deceptively simple cheeriness. NewJeans reminds me of the times I used to practice T-ara's "Roly Poly" shuffle, The Wonder Girls' "Nobody" sway, Sana of Twice's "shy shy shy" part from "Cheer Up," almost every 2NE1 single. I think that's what makes the song sound so fresh, despite its obvious Jersey Club influences, its soft, plain vocal tones and innocent melodies, a trademark of co-writer Erika de Casier. There's no larger story that "Super Shy" ties into, no mind bending concept other than the pure thought of crushing on someone. I can embody that.  [9]

Alfred Soto: You could dance to "Super Shy" -- I could dance to "Super Shy" -- but the drums 'n' bass loop reflects the hum of a person struggling to get outside herself (think Everything But the Girl's run of mid '90s albums). The track is almost strong enough to support a conversation about the differences between shyness and introversion.  [6]

Katherine St Asaph: The drum-and-bass loop is super au courant but also super polite, meant less for the dance floor than one's interior headspace. And the headspace this song has in mind is curated and chill: no build, no tension, no dramatics, no end to repetition, just safe unchanging reverie. Which is pretty and all, but "Super Shy" is supposed to be a song about a crush, and this is not what a crush feels like. (For me, at least. Must be nice.) [6]

Jonathan Bradley: A drum-and-bass beat shrunk down small enough to fit inside a locket, a shimmery little keepsake to be tucked away close to your chest and swooned over in lost private moments. Even in the song's its final moments, when the rhythm picks up with an insistent pulse, the synths retain their smeared pastel sheen. It's shyness not as coquetry but seclusion: a pretty little song to keep on your nightstand next to a scrapbook and a compact mirror. [8]

Brad Shoup: I love drum'n'bass because it's as versatile as potatoes, able to soundtrack both speed-fueled mania and chaste lil crushes. Here, the drums are like home fries: tiny and crisp. "Super Shy" has the kind of massive hook that extends grace to everything around it: the perfunctory, rattled-off rap feels like the rehearsal for a heist. In fact, all the parts where NewJeans seem to be talking to someone else, rather than plotting around them, are less interesting to me. Dozens of listens on, the crush stuff seems like a fig leaf for the joy of devising the perfect scheme. [8]

Aaron Bergstrom: A song that peeks its head out from around a corner and then disappears down the street before you know what's happening, chasing a skittering beat that dissolves into finger snaps when the mood strikes. By the time you get to the corner there's nothing but a shimmer in the air. [6]

Joshua Lu: NewJeans's brand of easy listening music remains refreshing, but "Super Shy" feels like they're establishing a formula for the first time. The staccato percussion and the frantic vocals sound like they were imported from "Ditto" and then just laid over a different instrumental, this time some glacial muzak like you're on hold for the chicest insurance agency of all time. These sounds do combine nicely, but it can't help but feel undercooked, especially with the short runtime that stops the song from going anywhere truly interesting. [6]

Joshua Minsoo Kim: The genius of NewJeans began with "Ditto," when they flattened a Baltimore club beat into a wistful portrait of holiday gratitude: less a grandiose fireworks show than sparklers in a backyard. It transcended its modish, bedroom-pop approach to dance music because it wasn't strictly referential -- it toyed with musical conventions to capture the complex emotions of anyone too in their head. "Super Shy" is similar, adopting glossy drum 'n' bass as a conduit for crushing hard, fast, and with no plans for action. The secret is in the beat switch to Jersey club-isms, arriving right as "You don't even know my name, do ya?" provides the most sublime hook of the year. It's both a question and a proclamation, a sign of yearning and relief: if this crush remains a crush, then I can't get hurt, right? I heard "Super Shy" in the club the night it came out, but it's a song ultimately befitting daydreams -- the stuttering beat provides all the pleasure you need, no movement needed. Its antiseptic sheen isn't some utopian future, but the blissfully static present. [9]

[Read, comment and vote on The Singles Jukebox ]

[matan4il]

I don't know if you watch Grey's Anatomy but in this week's episode (19x15), there's a kid who is a patient just when he was supposed to have his bar mitzvah, and so the doctors organize for him to be able to do it at the hospital. And he does it with his grandfather who hadn't been able to have one in Germany. It was really a nice scene :)

Awwww, Nonnie! Thank you for telling me! That sounds so sweet. I used to watch Grey's Anatomy, but i kind of had to stop. I loved Callie's storyline with Erica Hahn. I know, seems unpopular. She started out as a not-very-nice surgeon, but I liked it when they brought her back and allowed her to be more human. I liked that she became a multi-faceted character. And then when they were started to throw out hints about her and Callie? When they were doing the build up for them? Don't get me wrong, it was still NOT in the ballpark of hetero slow burns, I guess you could call it a 'mid burn', though it was still better than what most mlm couples get (with maybe the exception of Black Sails and Our Flag Means Death, at least of what I've seen). I was the eyes emoji. And then the show actually followed through, it ACTUALLY let them get together and kiss with the music swelling? :o I was in awe, I loved it, I was SO there for it. They even explored what it means for Erica to figure out she's gay later in life versus Callie exploring her bisexuality (I didn't always love how they went about Callie's bisexuality, but I did like that they let them each have her own discovery story).

And then they just... got rid of Erica? And in almost no time replaced her with Arizona? And it was so clear they were intent on telling a wlw story, which was awesome, but when the audience didn't react well enough to Erica, they just... got rid of her and brought in a younger, "softer" version of her, as if queer characters are that easily replaceable. I was offended. I LIKED having an older queer woman's story being told. And I get Erica didn't start out nice, but by the time her and Callie got together, I did like her. So it was hard for me to warm up to Arizona. And even when I kind of reluctantly accepted her, because hey, it's better than no queer rep for wlw, I ended up not liking a lot of what they did with Callie and Arizona. Like the way Callie gets pregnant. They had a ridiculous fight between her and Arizona, just so Callie wouldn't be technically cheating when she sleeps with Mark and gets pregnant, and then Arizona comes back and magically, all the stuff that drove her and Callie apart is not there anymore, and Arizona accepts the baby with relative ease, but it just became yet another storyline that doesn't show how MOST same sex parents ACTUALLY become parents. So IDK when exactly, but at some point around that time, I quit GA rather than quietly rage about how bad the wlw rep was IMO.

I want you just to understand what it means that you managed to make me wanna watch an ep of GA again! IDK, but I will. Thank you so much for telling me about that and just in case you're curious? There are actually a lot of real life stories like that! Holocaust survivors who get to make up for the bar and bat mitzvahs they were robbed off. Here's an example, there's a program that brings survivors annually to the Western Wall in Jerusalem to have their bar/bat mitzvah there! I find it very moving, because THEY are so clearly moved by what they get to do.

Have a great day, lovely! As always, my ask tag. xoxox

[kbirbpods]

Click below for my "dear podficcer," letter for Summer Swap 2023!

Dear Podficcer,

It's me, Kaje, I'm the problem I'm kbirb pods!

Things I like, regardless of fandom:

THEMES: trans/nobinary characters (extra points for neopronouns); gender exploration in general; found family (genfic or otherwise); angst with a happy ending; polyamory; good asexual or aromantic representation

TROPES: fix-it fics!! extra points for time travel or time loops in fix its; fake dating/marriage; mutual pining; soulmates (AU or just clearly soulmates); crack treated seriously; rivals-to-friends/lovers; oops only one bed

AUs: soulmates soulmates soulmates; regency era (or any different era); modern AU; crossovers, provided i know the other fandom or the fic doesn't require knowledge of the other fandom!; college/sport AU; fantasy/fae AUs

PODFIC SPECIFIC: anything epistolary (texting/chat fics especially but letters and such are also fun to explore); including music / SFX if you're comfortable; including bloopers if you have them/are comfortable exposing them

RATINGS: Contrary to popular belief I do not hate explicit fics so really any rating but I generally prefer G-M I guess

Do Not Wants (triggers, squicks, please no):

major archive warnings (major character death is okay so long as it's temporary and resolved); unhappy endings; I really don't like pregnancy, which includes MPREG (I like a/b/o dynamics minus that aspect) - kidfic is cool I just don't want pregnancy as a theme & especially not graphic depictions of it; suicide/self-harm "on screen" (mentions of past suicidal ideation/self harm are fine if not a flashback/graphic); non-/dub-con or any depictions of rape (once again, recovery is okay if done well); adult/minor relationships or relationships with unaddressed/starkly imbalanced power dynamics; any sort of poorly depicted mental health tropes (no BPD or other personality disorder bashing, no institutionalization, no "split personality" as a trope) - i really like explorations of PTSD/trauma but it has to be handled with fidelity and gentleness

Main Fandoms I Would Love to Receive:

Star Wars: I love so much Star Wars that to split them like I did on AO3 would make this post too long. I think it's easiest to say this: I prefer Clone Wars, Rebels, anything about Jon Antilles, and anything Ahsoka Tano.

My main ships are: Cody/Obi-Wan, Kallus/Zeb, Hevy/anyone (consensual), Finn/Poe or Finn/Poe/Rey, blackkat rarepairs (mainly Jon Antilles/anyone), Jon Antilles & Fay (platonic), Waxer/Boil, Fives/Echo, Kanan/Hera, and Quinlan/Fox My favorite characters are: Hevy, Fox, Ahsoka, Leia, Poe, Fives, Luke, Jon Antilles, Fay (Legends) My favorite themes/tropes are: force sensitive clones, trans!clones, force sensitive Leia, modern AUs, Domino Squad lives

Ted Lasso: My current hyperfixation! My favorite ships are Roy/Keeley/Jamie, Ted/Trent, Roy/Keeley, and Jamie/Dani. Ted & Rebecca as platonic soulmates/besties in general. I love explorations of how much Dr. Jacob sucks and fix-its for the ending!

Batfam/DC: I can be picky and yet not? Basically, I just prefer no inner-Batfam fics of the boys because I truly view them as brothers. My favorite ships are Jason Todd/Roy Harper, Dick Grayson/Wally West, Harley/Ivy, Tim Drake/Kon, and Wally/Artemis from Young Justice. This is the fandom that I specifically am obsessed with found family in. I love exploring Alfred being the boys Grandpa and Bruce's complex dadhood.

The Locked Tomb: dying waiting for Alecto news..... I'm definitely Gideon/Harrow on main; I really like fics where one or both of them are trans/nonbinary. Nona is my favorite character so explorations of her found family (the household or the friends or all of them) are important to me. Cam/Pal is important to me. I love modern AUs a lot.

Additional Fandoms I Love:

Teen Wolf: I'm basic and therefore Sterek on main! But I also really love Scisaac and never get enough content for them. Boyd/Erica is always so good. Scott/Isaac/Allison and Scott/Allison hold a special place in my heart, too. I'll never say no to Lydia/Allison or Lydia/Kira either. Found family is incredible for this fandom, too, especially Mama McCall adopting any of the pack! Magic!Stiles is my shit and I love explorations of the Hale family being alive. Genfic is wonderful.

Our Flag Means Death: Obviously Blackbeard/Stede is a big deal and I ship it forever. But my heart belongs to Jim/Olu and any explorations of Jim's gender identity! Pining Izzy Hands makes me weak, as long as he's not being abusive towards Edward or Stede.

All for the Game: My two main pairs are Jean/Jeremy and Allison/Renee but of course Andrew/Neil is always a yes. Andrew/Neil/Kevin is my weakness. My favorite friendships to explore are Renee & Andrew, Renee & Jean, Allison & Neil, and Renee & Neil. (Can you tell who my fave is). I like any fics exploring any of the Fox friendships, though!

The Old Guard: I really like fics that explore the gang's experiences in other time periods. Andy/Quynh is my OTP along with Joe/Nicky so any fics about them. Nile/Quynh is my favorite rarepair in the fandom. I like fics that look at Andy & Booker's friendship and why they're definitely platonic soulmates.

I selected a few other fandoms like First Kill; The Adventure Zone; Red, White and Royal Blue; Good Omens; The Tarot Sequence; and Sandman. I didn't talk much about them because I'm basically just into the main ships for them (Juliette/Cal for FK, Taako/Kravitz for TAZ, Aubrey/Dani for TAZ, Alex/Henry for RWRB, Crowley/Az for GO, Rune/Addam or Rune/Addam/Brand for TTS, Hob/Dream for Sandman). For Teen Wolf and First Kill I don't like Mature/Explicit fics unless they're adults in it. My favorite TAZ eras are Balance and Amnesty.

Fandoms/Ships I Will Create Content For:

Anything I listed above with any of the caveats! This would get really long if I repeated those again. THAT BEING SAID: I will create content for those fandoms even if it's not one of my listed ships.

However I will not create podfic for the following ships: STAR WARS: Rey/Kylo, Leia/Luke, Rex/Ahsoka, any Master/Padawan relationship, or Palpatine/Anakin. BATFAM: inner!Batboys as mentioned TED LASSO: Ted/Jamie (love Ted & Jamie tho) AFTG: Andrew/Aaron SANDMAN: Dream/any of his siblings

Other fandoms I will create content for:

ATLA: Zuko/Sokka, found family Star Trek: Spock/Kirk, Spock/Kirk/Bones, Kirk/Bones Leverage: OT3 is Hardison/Parker/Eliot LOTR / The Hobbit: Gimli/Legolas, Eowyn/Faramir, Boromir/being alive, Bilbo/Thorin. I like anything just exploring the lore and history of the universe and its cultures Venom: Venom/Eddie(/Annie/Dan) The Witcher: Yen/Jaskier/Geralt, Jaskir/Geralt, Geralt/Triss, Yen/Triss Sense8: anything I can find! it's small but there's nothing I won't do in this fandom, honestly... Trigun: Vash/Wolfwood (the only thing I know about it) Marvel/MCU: Steve/Bucky, Clint/Bucky, Kate Bishop/America Chavez, and Spideypool (as long as they're both adults). WITH A LOT OF CAVEATS... Harry Potter. I will only podfic trans-centric Tonks who does not get with Remus or Wolfstar with a happy ending.

Love, Kaje / kbirb